100
4 votes
Jul 19, 2015

From Wikipedia:

The bill's stated purpose is: "To rein in the dragnet collection of data by the National Security Agency (NSA) and other government agencies, increase transparency of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC), provide businesses the ability to release information regarding FISA requests, and create an independent constitutional advocate to argue cases before the FISC."

I think this is a that has the potential for bi-partisan support and I think it generally reflects popular sentiment against the extent of the NSA's operations and the desire on the part of the public to know what is going on in the FISC and how these decisions are being made.

Personally, I support the existence of the NSA and I support government spying programs but with reservations; there need to be clear and public checks and balances. The past two administrations have taken a sort-of "trust us" approach where the public is expected to trust that the "FISC" - a mysterious and extra-judicial organization if there ever was one - would make the right call. This obviously doesn't cut it.

I would like to see more information about this bill before making any definitive judgment, however. For now, my vote is "yes."

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100
linked reply
2 votes,
Jul 19, 2015

From congress.gov: "Prohibits the searching of collections of communications of U.S. persons, except: (1) under an order or authorization for electronic surveillance or physical search, (2) with the consent of such person, or (3) under a reasonable belief that the life or safety of the person in threatened and the information is sought to assist that person."

This is the same kind of loophole that allows officers to stop and search any vehicle they want to. Reasonable belief leaves a fuzzy line that is easy to cross and argue later without any real consequences. They don't need authorization to look through your data if they have reasonable belief that it might affect the safety of someone somewhere.

It is definitely an improvement, with the attempt 'to rein in the dragnet collection of data by the NSA', but I don't think this will fix all of the problems.

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100
main reply
2 votes,
Jul 19, 2015

I agree that, for now, this is supportable but it is not a real solution to the problem. We need to have transparency: Anything less and the tool gets used against the general public; we've seen this happen time and time again in the U.S.

We can't trust elected representatives standing in place of transparency, they serve themselves and their money masters first and the general public be damned. Adding more "oversight" via elected persons or governmental bodies doesn't fix the problem when the overseers themselves are untrustworthy.

If transparency cannot reasonably be achieved, then disassemble the tools and prohibit them. Having tools like these under control of a corrupt governing system is worse than the alternative of no tool at all.

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