(via @57UN)
It’s called the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act, or CISPA (siss-PAH!; you have to shout the last syllable). The far-reaching and vaguely-worded cyberintelligence-sharing bill that passed the House just last year, but was not taken up by the Senate due to the threat of a veto (and the clamorous upheaval of t3h Int3rn3tz) is threatening to cast it’s gloomy shadow over our legislature once more.
Unimpeded by such paltry concerns as ‘constituent demand’ or ‘voter outrage’, the likes of Rep. Dutch Ruppersberger (D-Md.) and Chairman Mike Rogers (R-Mich.) are resurrecting the bill from it’s mouldering tomb and re-introducing it, possibly as early as next week.
For those who don’t recall, a quote to refresh your memory that CISPA….
“…would allow for the sharing of Internet traffic information between the U.S. government and certain technology and manufacturing companies. The stated aim of the bill is to help the U.S government investigate cyber threats and ensure the security of networks against cyberattack.”
Allow me a moment to explain the gravity of ‘greater information sharing’ between private companies and the State. Have you ever filled out a job application? If you have, it is likely that it carried a logo from a company like Acxiom, or ChoicePoint or LexisNexis. Odds are also good that you’re aware of the vast amounts of information stored by companies like Google. It is undoubtedly unsettling, the amount of information that these companies hold about us: financial records, medical history, employment history, browsing habits, communications, and so on. Knowledge is Power, and I don’t really believe any one entity should have so much of either; but here’s the key point: These companies are bound by law, and do NOT have the power of police enforcement. There are legal barriers that prevent these companies handing out your personal data without extreme extenuating circumstances.
CISPA abolishes that barrier. It allows the State free access to these treasure-troves of private information and meta-data.
This may not mean a whole lot to those of you who, when faced with encroachments upon your privacy or civil liberties, cry ‘I’ve done nothing wrong! I don’t have any secrets; why should I be afraid?” I answer with the words of Thomas Drake, former analyst for the NSA: ‘In a secret surveillance state, you don’t get to decide what’s wrong, or what’s secret – the government does.’ What you think is an innocent and/or legal act (and may well be… now) might make you a ‘person of interest’ in a year’s time.
You don’t even necessarily have to be doing anything wrong. If you torture Data enough, it will tell you anything. ‘Data divorced from context has no meaning’; if you lose the context, you get to invent the meaning.
I can’t even begin to relay how important it is that we stand up and fight for our civil liberties and rights to privacy. These are the sorts of things that, once we allow them to be taken away, we are almost never given them back.
Take a moment to contact and harangue your nearest member of the House Intelligence Committee:
ZackBlog 