Hello friends
As some of you may know, in the U.S., Section 702 of the Foreign
Intelligence Surveillance Act
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foreign_Intelligence_Surveillance_Act_of_1978_Amendments_Act_of_2008>
is up for reauthorization at the end of this year. This is the statute that
allegedly authorizes the U.S. National Security Agency’s mass surveillance
practices being challenged in Wikimedia Foundation v. NSA
<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia_Foundation_v._NSA>.[1] We briefly
mentioned the impending reauthorization debate in our most recent blog post
<https://blog.wikimedia.org/2017/06/23/wikimedia-v-nsa-present-future/>
about the case.
While we firmly believe that mass surveillance is unconstitutional and
unethical, we are also monitoring the legislative debate around the
reauthorization of Section 702. Courts must evaluate the NSA’s surveillance
practices, but we also believe that certain reforms to Section 702 could be
a positive step forward.
One major issue on the agenda is what’s called the “backdoor search”
loophole. After the U.S. government amasses a vast amount of sensitive
internet communications, agents are allowed to search through databases of
these communications for individuals’ personal information, including the
personal information of U.S. citizens and residents. One problem here is
that they don’t need a warrant for this, which allows them to perform
searches without judicial oversight or a need to demonstrate probable
cause.
To be sure, we believe that the government’s initial mass collection of
these communications is illegal per se. However, as the ACLU’s Ashley
Gorski has observed
<https://www.aclu.org/blog/national-security/privacy-and-surveillance/time-reform-debate-new-documents-shed-light>,
backdoor searches of Americans’ communications compound the legal problems
associated with the U.S. government’s implementation of Section 702. We
think that closing the backdoor search loophole would be a small but
significant step towards addressing these many legal problems identified by
the ACLU. In addition, while the lack of a warrant requirement primarily
implicates the communications of American citizens and residents, we are
aware that the communications of people around the world are swept up by
this surveillance. We consider this to be a violation of the human rights
to privacy and freedom of expression.
Mass surveillance, by any government, and no matter the location of those
subjected to it, is repugnant to the spirit of the Wikimedia movement. We
believe that everyone should be free to read and share knowledge
<https://policy.wikimedia.org/policy-landing/privacy/> without government
monitoring.
Regards,
Jan
[1] You can read more about the case on our landing page
<https://policy.wikimedia.org/stopsurveillance/>.
==
Jan Gerlach
Public Policy Manager
Wikimedia Foundation
*new address (Oct. 2, 2017)*:
1 New Montgomery Street, Suite 1600
San Francisco, CA 94104
jgerlach(a)wikimedia.org
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