By George Huber
It’s increasingly difficult not to think of George Orwell whenever the government discusses its data collection and plans for the future. In a January speech, President Obama expressed his hope that the National Security Agency would stop collecting call records in bulk, and a recent New York Times article detailed his administration’s new legislative proposal to overhaul the phone records program. The proposed legislation, however, may not go far enough to ease many concerns about the government’s data surveillance.
The origins of the call record program trace back to 2001. After the Patriot Act passed, President George W. Bush unilaterally established the program and retroactively sought legitimization from the Justice Department in 2006. The program remained secret until the Edward Snowden leaks revealed that the government retains call records for five years for potential analysis. The data collection is not limited to the United States, and according to the New York Times, it also includes recording “all telephone calls and their routing data” in some foreign countries.
These phone data issues are only part of the the public privacy problem, as the N.S.A. and British Government Communications Headquarters (G.C.H.Q.) also utilized information from other databases, such as 1.8 million Yahoo webcam accounts. Through these webcam accounts, the N.S.A. and G.C.H.Q. were able to monitor people through personal cameras, often catching unaware people having sex.
Naturally, the ensuing outrage from these disclosures caused several ripple effects. The public began steering clear of U.S. technology companies in an effort to escape their own government, and foreign tech companies are reaping the benefits. In response, Mark Zuckerberg recently criticized the U.S. government and called for a unified effort for greater security and privacy. In his post from March 13th, Zuckerberg stressed that Facebook tries to keep data secure but “it seems like it will take a very long time for true full reform.”
President Obama’s proposal begins the road to reform with baby steps that preserve the N.S.A.’s security functions. The administration hopes to renew the program for 90 days before taking on major changes in the future. In the Obama administration’s proposal, the judiciary would take on a heavier role by determining the standard of suspicion needed for the N.S.A. to access a phone number. With a conservative leaning Supreme Court, however, it is possible that reform via the judiciary will be lost to agency and security deference. The proposal would also clarify Section 215 of the Patriot Act to determine whether or not it allows bulk collection of data, which is especially important given that an independent review group stated that the current interpretation is unconstitutional. The problem here is that this clarification is limited only to calls and leaves reforms regarding other forms of data collection for another time. If the Patriot Act is reinstated by the government next year without wholesale changes beyond those laid out in this proposal, then hopes for more significant reform may be dashed.
Links from this Article
Photo Credit: https://pixabay.com/en/network-connection-pc-web-address-197300/
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/25/us/obama-to-seek-nsa-curb-on-call-data.html?hp&_r=0
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/19/us/leaked-file-details-us-phone-monitoring-abroad.html?src=rechp
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/feb/27/gchq-nsa-webcam-images-internet-yahoo