Ashcroft 'to defend' Patriot Act
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The US Attorney General says a court ruling attacking the Patriot Act as unconstitutional is likely to go to appeal.
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(InfoWorld) - U.S. lawmakers promised to push ahead legislation aimed at cracking down on pretexting despite some objections from telecom carriers and the U.S. Department of Justice. Nearly all the members of the House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee pledged to push the Prevention of Fraudulent Access to Phone Records Act, which would give the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) authority to file lawsuits against pretexters and the people who hire them. The bill would also require the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to draw up new rules for telecom carriers to protect private phone records, and it would prevent carriers from sharing customer information with third parties without permission. Despite some concerns about the bill, lawmakers said consumers need protection against pretexting, the practice of posing as a telecom customer to obtain phone records and other private information. "Someone with bad intentions and a few bucks can get a hold of almost anybody's cell phone records," said Representative Fred Upton, a Michigan Republican. President George Bush signed a bill creating criminal penalties for pretexting in January. But proponents of the Prevention of Fraudulent Access to Phone Records Act say the extra protections in the bill are also needed. The Energy and Commerce Committee approved the same bill during the last session of Congress, but the legislation apparently was held up on the House floor because of concerns from federal law enforcement agencies that the bill could slow efforts to get information on terrorism suspects. Lawmakers from both parties complained that they received little explanation about why the bill died last year. Thomas Navin, chief of the FCC's Wireline Bureau, said the Department of Justice was concerned that the FCC would set up rules that consumers are notified too soon after their phone records were accessed by someone else. The DOJ wanted a delay of seven days before consumers were notified, he said. But Representative Ed Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat, said consumers should be notified immediately. "I don't think the Department of Justice should be listened to on that issue," he said. "I think [victims] should be listened to on that issue." Markey pointed to news reports this week saying the FBI may have violated the law and its internal rules while collecting telephone, data, and other personal records through the Patriot Act. "There is still a lack of respect for the law of our country," he said. Beyond the law enforcement concerns, representatives of trade groups the United States Telecom Association and CTIA-The Wireless Association said the bill could prevent them from sharing customer information with third parties that market complementary products. CTIA members don't share customers' personal information with unrelated groups, but the carriers do use third-party vendors to market wireless-related products, said Steve Largent, CTIA's president and CEO. But Representative Joe Barton, a Texas Republican, questioned industry concerns about language in the bill that could require carriers to get opt-in permission from customers to share their personal data. "It seems if we want to protect privacy, we should change this from opt out to opt in," he said.
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Raising the gavel with a grin, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter opened his first hearing Thursday by allowing more criticism of the Bush administration than his predecessor and by questioning some of the Patriot Act's police powers.
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Congressional Democrats and some Republicans are trying to change part of the USA Patriot Act that allows the Bush administration to fire and replace federal prosecutors indefinitely without Senate confirmation.
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A federal judge on Wednesday rejected a surveillance provision of the USA Patriot Act which requires Internet providers to supply personal information about customers to the federal government, and bars them from disclosing that they received a special
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Members of Congress vowed today to conduct investigative hearings -- and consider reining in parts of the Patriot Act -- following revelations of pervasive problems in the FBI's use of national security letters to secretly obtain telephone, e-mail and financial records in terrorism cases.
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Civil liberties and media reform group Free Press called on the U.S. Congress to reject bills that would give retroactive legal immunity to telecommunication carriers that helped the government monitor phone calls and e-mail after Vice President Dick Cheney pushed for the legislation.Cheney and the White House this week pushed Congress to extend the surveillance authorization bill, the Protect America Act, which expires on Feb. 1. Cheney, speaking Wednesday at conservative think tank the Heritage Foundation, also called on Congress to grant legal immunity to telecom carriers that participated in a U.S. National Security Agency program that allowed the NSA to intercept communications of some U.S. residents without court authorization.It&#39;s &quot;entirely appropriate&quot; for U.S. intelligence agencies to seek help from private-sector companies, because agencies don&#39;t have the facilities to conduct all the surveillance needed to keep the United States safe, Cheney said in the speech, made available on YouTube.&quot;Some [telecom] providers are facing dozens of lawsuits right now,&quot; Cheney said. &quot;Why? Because they are believed to have aided the U.S. government in the effort to intercept international communications of al Qaeda-related individuals.&quot;Even if the lawsuits are dismissed, defending them will place an &quot;enormous burden&quot; on telecom providers, and the lawsuits could stop other companies from cooperating with U.S. authorities in the future, Cheney added. &quot;Liability protection, retroactive to [the Sept. 11 attacks] is the right thing to do, it&#39;s the right thing to help us prevent another 9/11 down the road,&quot; he said.AT&amp;T and other telecom carriers are being sued in U.S. court in San Francisco by civil liberties groups and individuals who allege that the surveillance program is illegal.Free Press countered Cheney&#39;s remarks by saying telecom carriers should be held accountable for illegal spying.&quot;Phone companies are supposed to deliver our messages, not spy on them,&quot; Josh Silver, executive director of Free Press, said in a statement. &quot;But at every turn, these telco giants trample on basic constitutional principles of privacy and free speech. When you break the law, you should face the consequences.&quot;The lawsuits will show U.S. residents that phone company spying &quot;will not be tolerated,&quot; he added.The American Civil Liberties Union has called the Protect America Act, the &quot;Police America Act.&quot; The legislation &quot;allows for massive, untargeted collection of international communications without court order or meaningful oversight by either Congress or the courts,&quot; the ACLU says on its Web site. &quot;It contains virtually no protections for the U.S. end of the phone call or e-mail, leaving decisions about the collection, mining, and use of Americans&#39; private communications up to this administration.&quot;Sen. Christopher Dodd, a Connecticut Democrat, said Wednesday he&#39;ll block the legislation with a filibuster if it comes to the Senate floor with telecom immunity provisions attached.&quot;Few things are more detrimental to this country than the erosion of and attack on the civil liberties we enjoy,&quot; Dodd said in a statement. &quot;More and more, Americans are rejecting the false choice that has come to define this administration: security or liberty, but never, ever both.&quot;
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White House-backed legislation on   the treatment of terrorism suspects may protect them from   torture but gives the United States immunity from legal   challenges, human rights groups say.
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Attorney General John Ashcroft said Thursday that the Bush administration will more than likely appeal a federal court ruling that struck
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As he sought to renew the USA Patriot Act two years ago, Attorney General Alberto R. Gonzales assured lawmakers that the FBI had not abused its potent new terrorism-fighting powers. "There has not been one verified case of civil liberties abuse," Gonzales told senators on April 27, 2005.
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The man who may be Bush's choice to replace departing Attorney General John Ashcroft
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U.S. Sen. Conrad Burns accused his Democratic challenger Saturday of wanting to raise taxes and weaken the U.S. Patriot Act, but brushed off allegations of ties to convicted lobbyist Jack Abramoff.
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The U.S. Senate is likely this week   to pass a bill that outlines rules for interrogating terrorism   suspects and bringing them to trial, Senate Majority Leader   Bill Frist said on Sunday.
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(InfoWorld) - Since terrorists attacked the U.S. on Sept. 11, 2001, the government has begun a robust, and oft-criticized, electronic-surveillance program, but other IT-related security projects designed to thwart terrorism have made little progress. Better cybersecurity leadership, more cargo scanning on airplanes and ships and interoperable communications networks for emergency response agencies have all developed slowly. In some cases, fights in Congress have slowed progress, or the U.S. government has focused on other priorities. In other cases, the cost of IT projects has been an issue. The fifth anniversary of the attacks will focus attention as much on what has not been accomplished to protect the U.S. from future attacks as on what has been, chiefly the surveillance system. In recent months, civil liberties groups have protested the shadowy electronic-surveillance program run by the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA), with alleged cooperation from large telecommunications carriers. U.S. President George Bush has defended the program as necessary and legal, even as critics point out the NSA is spying on U.S. residents without court orders. Critics say the emphasis on surveillance instead of other technology has led to an invasion of innocent people's privacy and has not improved the nationâs security. The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), leading a lawsuit against AT&T Inc. for its alleged participation in the NSA surveillance program, says some U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation agents have complained about the quality of the leads generated by the program. âItâs like, âOh great, more calls to Pizza Hut,ââ said Kevin Bankston, an EFF staff attorney. âThis many may not help us connect the dots -- it may just be creating more dots.â But there hasnât been a major outcry about the NSA program from U.S. residents, with a common attitude being that innocent people should have nothing to hide. âI worry that a lot of people are speaking out of fear,â Bankston said. âYou wouldnât want government cameras installed in your bedroom or your bathroom, not because youâre doing anything wrong there, but because there are areas of our lives that should be private.â The biggest change since Sept. 11 is this culture of surveillance, added Jim Dempsey, policy director at the Center for Democracy and Technology, an advocacy group focused on civil liberties online. Congressâ quick passage of the Patriot Act following Sept. 11 generated huge debates about its expansion of law enforcement powers, but the NSA program happened without congressional approval, he said. âAll the ink that was spilled over the Patriot Act is irrelevant â¦ if the president says heâll do what he wants,â Dempsey added. Combined with technology advances in areas such as storage, location awareness and facial recognition, these expanded government powers create âa pretty wholesale assault on privacy.â The Bush administration has defended its tactics, with the president saying this month that the governmentâs counterterrorism efforts have subverted a number of plots since 9/11, including an anthrax attack and an airplane hijacking plan. The NSA surveillance program âhelps protect Americans,â Bush said in a speech Thursday. He called on Congress to derail court challenges to the NSA program by passing laws approving the program. âIf an al Qaeda commander is calling the United States, we need to know why theyâre calling,â he said. In three other IT-related areas, progress has been slow. Cybersecurity IT security groups have called for greater U.S. government emphasis on cybersecurity. In July 2005, U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Michael Chertoff announced plans to create a high-level position, assistant secretary for cybersecurity, but that position remains unfilled, despite pressure from IT groups. In addition, the DHS has never scored above an "F" in the federal government's annual computer security assessment. Another agency that has consistently pulled in "Fs" is the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, which was roiled earlier this year following a massive data breach. Part of the problem is that the government is simply not as interested as it should be in paying for online defense, according to Marcus Sachs, a former Bush administration advisor on Internet security. "It's kind of hard to convince the Congress to continue to fund cybersecurity efforts when the entire nation is shaking in its boots over chemical weapons and dirty bombs," said Sachs, who now works for SRI International, a research organization in Menlo Park, California. "We've not had any attributable cyberstuff that you could trace back to terrorism ... it's hard to make a case as to why we need to be worried about it." Those kinds of attacks may still come, said O. Sami Saydjari, founder and president of Cyber Defense Agency LLC, an IT security research and consulting firm in Wisconsin Rapids, Wisconsin. Just one massive cyberattack would boost U.S. cyberdefense spending, but a major attack could cost U.S. businesses up to US$1 trillion, he said. The technology to sufficiently harden U.S. cyberdefenses largely exists, but the government needs to create a program to improve the nationâs cybersecurity infrastructure, Saydjari said. âWaiting until we have these attacks is not the time to develop that program,â he added. âEvery year, the [cyber] attacks are better.â Communications interoperability for emergency response agencies Security experts, including the 9/11 Commission, have requested additional radio spectrum so that emergency response agencies can better communicate with each other. During the Sept. 11 attacks, some emergency responders found that their communication systems did not interoperate. More radio spectrum is on the way, but not until February 2009, the deadline Congress set for television stations to vacate the spectrum and move to all digital broadcasts. During a lengthy congressional debate over the digital TV transition, Senator John McCain, an Arizona Republican, tried to move up the transition date, arguing emergency responders need the spectrum as soon as possible. But congressional concerns over the timing of commercial auctions for part of the freed spectrum led to the later date. If the auctions were too soon, the spectrum might not sell for the $10 billion Congress has budgeted, opponents of an earlier deadline said. Meanwhile, some emergency response agencies are working with each other to improve interoperability, but those efforts are happening only in âpocketsâ of the U.S., said Steven Jones, executive director of the First Response Coalition, a group advocating for interoperable emergency communications. âThereâs no national strategy to coordinate all these efforts,â Jones said. âNationally speaking, I donât know that weâre better off than we were five years ago.â Cargo scanning Hobbled by high costs and slow machines, airlines and cargo ships scan only a fraction of the baggage they carry, leaving their passengers at risk of hidden explosives and other weapons, critics say. Most of the 6 billion pounds of cargo shipped on passenger airlines every year is commercial cargo, not checked baggage, and most of those crates and cartons are never scanned, exposing passengers to risk, according to U.S. Representative Edward Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat. The problem is even greater on commercial shipping venues, with unscanned cargo rolling into the U.S. every year aboard 11.2 million trucks, 2.2 million rail cars and 51,000 cargo ships, according to the DHS. The U.S. Transportation Security Administration, which operates airport security systems, says it faces a dilemma of choosing between inexpensive but inaccurate machines and expensive, high-quality machines. Airport workers now scan baggage with two types of systems. Explosive trace detection machines are affordable -- they're the size of a laser printer and cost a few thousand dollars -- but rely on slow and error-prone human workers to collect test samples. In contrast, explosive detection system machines can process up to 500 bags per hour but weigh as much as 17,000 pounds and cost up to $1 million. And airports must invest much more money to insert those machines into their existing baggage conveyor belts to speed the process. Still, officials with the Bush administration insist they've made significant progress in fighting terrorism over the last five years. A "network" of law enforcement and intelligence agencies, improved terrorist databases and international cooperation have successfully thwarted multiple terrorist plots, U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said in a speech Thursday. "If there is one thing that all Americans will be thinking and saying when we mark a terrible anniversary on Monday, it will be the simple phrase, 'never again,'" he said. "And the goal of 'never again' cannot be achieved by the federal government alone, by any state government alone, or by any local police force alone. Our network of prevention is instead the key to protecting the American people."
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Attorney General Alberto Gonzales on Monday defended the Bush administration's strategy for interrogating terror suspects, calling it legal and critical to "continue gathering information about our enemies."
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SCHEVENINGEN, Netherlands  - U.S. Attorney General  John Ashcroft said on Thursday the Bush administration is  likely to appeal a U.S. District Court ruling that part of the  Patriot Act was unconstitutional.
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Outgoing Attorney General John D. Ashcroft argued that tough law enforcement and intelligence gathering were "expansions of freedom" that helped prevent terrorist attacks on the U.S.