CISPA is quietly being pushed through Congress; it could be far more dangerous than SOPA if it becomes law. David Seaman explains.
You can find more information here.
List of corporations supporting CISPA.
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CISPA, or the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protect Act, also known as HR 3523 is a cybersecurity House bill that’s already gained over 100 sponsors and is perhaps the worst of them all. It would allow companies to collect and monitor private communications and share them with the government, and anyone else. So is it really as scary as it sounds? EFF’s Trevor Timm explains.
You can find more information here.
List of corporations supporting CISPA.
With a lot of effort, Americans were able to strike down SOPA. Congress has responded by reintroducing it via several different bills, the worst being the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA). Under this bill, anything deemed a threat or inappropriate, will shared with the government.
CISPA would give companies the power to collect information on customers and give it to the government. A request for the information is all that would be needed.
CISPA is not solely related to cyber threats. It’s written so broadly that nearly all of your internet activity can be monitored by the government. This bill could potentially turn everything you do into a criminal offense with jail time. Considering the fact that private prisons are demanding 90% occupancy rates and we aren’t filling them up fast enough with drug criminals, we’ll have to settle for those pesky pirates who download movies and music. Besides, if they don’t pass these bills, the NSA spy center won’t have any work to do.
CDT warned months ago that the broadness of the bill was going to be a major problem for Americans.
the bill goes much further, permitting ISPs to funnel private communications and related information back to the government without adequate privacy protections and controls. The bill does not specify which agencies ISPs could disclose customer data to, but the structure and incentives in the bill raise a very real possibility that the National Security Agency or the DOD’s Cybercommand would be the primary recipient.
From the bill itself:
“Prohibits a civil or criminal cause of action against a protected entity, a self-protected entity (an entity that provides goods or services for cybersecurity purposes to itself), or a cybersecurity provider acting in good faith under the above circumstances.”
It’s amazing that this bill is considered “protection” with these types of clauses written into them. This means that surveillance can be started merely by the government or a corporation saying it needs to be, but then, if the information was wrong and did damage to an individual, there is no recourse to sue.
According to the ACLU, all four bills that have been introduced are exempt from public disclosure laws, such as the FOIA. You no longer have the right to know what they’re doing against you.
The ACLU has created a chart of the four bills and what’s happening in each one.
You can read a breakdown of the bill and be better informed about what it says.
Here is the list of corporations that support the bill.
Tell Congress not to pass this legislation. You can sign the EFF petition or contact your legislators directly.
The government’s tactics are to wear down its citizens until they are so fatigued that they let one of these bills slip by. Don’t let fatigue get to you. It is in your best interest to continue to fight these bills because the alternatives are far worse than what you think.
Al Madrigal travels to Arizona, where the powerful evidence of hearsay convinced the Tucson school board to ban Mexican-American studies programs.
