BUSH SIGNS HOMELAND BILL AND PLEDGES DEFENSE AGAINST CYBERTERROR
Privacy and industry groups responded with opposing views of the homeland security bill signed into law by President Bush, particularly in response to provisions that will keep certain data about critical infrastructure and cybersecurity vulnerabilities out of the public domain. Bush said the law would improve the govt.’s ability to collect and analyze terrorist threat information: “The Department [of Homeland Security -- DHS] will match this intelligence against the nation’s vulnerabilities, and work with other agencies, and the private sector, and state and local governments to harden America’s defenses against terror.”
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Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) Exec. Dir. Marc Rotenberg expressed mixed views about the law in a news conference Mon. He said the establishment of a privacy office at DHS “was an important recognition by Congress” of the need to protect civil liberties and safeguard privacy. However, he said the law contained several elements that would “limit the public’s right to know.” In addition to preventing the release of threat data voluntarily shared by industry with the govt., thereby watering down the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), DHS won’t be subject to additional oversight under the Federal Advisory Committee Act, which typically is applied to newly created federal entities, he said.
EPIC Gen. Counsel David Sobel said industry succeeded in perpetuating an “urban myth” that existing FOIA protections were insufficient. He said that success occurred despite the inability of industry, during debate over the last 2 years on whether to amend FOIA, to provide evidence that the govt. accidentally released such protected data: “There was never one example put forward.”
The Information Technology Assn. of America (ITAA) applauded the law for enabling industry to share “potentially sensitive information” with the govt. “without fear of public disclosure” under FOIA. ITAA Pres. Harris Miller said: “This legislation removes the impediments to fielding the best IT solutions for the public, whether that means sharing the information vital to cyberdefense or bounding the risk of contractors’ building safeguards.”
Raising public awareness about controversial Total Information Awareness (TIA) program being developed by Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) will take center stage of privacy community’s efforts, Rotenberg and others said at news conference. TIA program has come under fire for reportedly seeking to develop technology that would give Dept. of Defense access to combination of govt. and private sector databases, as well as to intercept communications and e-mail without court authorization. Based on what is known about new program, Rotenberg said it had become clear that “TIA is the hub in a whole series of research activities” related to govt. surveillance. He said that although proposed budget for TIA in FY 2003 was listed as $10 million, several projects were under way at DoD that were correlated with TIA. When taken as whole, the 2003 budget for TIA and related programs is at least $117 million, he said.
Rotenberg called for removal of former Reagan Administration official John Poindexter as director of DARPA’s Information Awareness Office (IAO), which runs TIA initiative. He said Poindexter’s role in Iran-Contra scandal wasn’t reason he should be removed from overseeing TIA, but rather because of his past involvement in govt. surveillance projects. He described Poindexter as architect of programs under President Reagan -- programs later rejected by Reagan and halted upon enactment of Computer Security Act -- that sought to bolster govt.’s collection of information from databases outside federal control. Those activities and response to those programs “makes him unsuitable to head the [IAO],” Rotenberg said.
Federation of American Scientists’ Project on Govt. Secrecy Dir. Steven Aftergood said “what’s at stake is the character of our government, and the relationship of our government to its citizens.” He said TIA program, unlike other actions taken in wake of Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, “touches people in an intimate way.” For example, he said, changes in Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act focused primarily on foreign suspects and people suspected of collaborating with terrorists. TIA, on other hand, could lead to broad surveillance of public places and attempted matching of personally identifiable characteristics via numerous public and private databases. Aftergood said it was “documentable fact” that such initiatives, combined with increased secrecy under Bush Administration, had little to do with 9/11: “We're talking about the predisposition of this Administration toward secrecy.”
ACLU Legislative Counsel Katie Corrigan said that just as privacy groups successfully had educated people nationwide about govt.’s proposed Operation TIPS program -- which sought to recruit cable and phone installers as extended eyes and ears of govt. -- same success would be achieved on TIA. DHS law explicitly prevents creation of TIPS because of public and congressional outrage. She said ACLU and others would attempt to bring equal citizen pressure on govt. to rein in TIA surveillance program.