alaric hunter's List: Term 13: Privacy Internet

           

House lawmakers have reintroduced a bill that civil liberties groups say would destroy the right to Internet privacy as we know it. An earlier version of the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act, or CISPA (pdf), passed the House back in April 2012; it died quickly under threat of presidential veto and widespread protest from Internet activists. But this week, House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers (R-Michigan) and ranking member Dutch Ruppersberger (D-Maryland) brought it back. What's going on?

 

Ruppersberger argues that CISPA is necessary to fight a cyber-security threat that has expanded since last spring – alluding to recent Chinese hacking attacks on newspapers including The New York Times and Washington Post. "People ask me all the time, 'What keeps you up at night?' And I say, 'Spicy Mexican food, weapons of mass destruction and cyber attacks,'" Ruppersberger tells Rolling Stone. "We have a serious problem. We're trying to fix this problem."

Today, private companies are tracking as many of our movements as they can online, selling that information to other companies who in turn share it with law enforcement and the government. The technology they use to do this tracking is advancing rapidly and has become highly sophisticated, and individuals have little chance of keeping abreast of what is taking place when they surf, let alone taking the complex steps necessary to prevent this spying.

 

As stewards of our digital lives, companies are the first line of defense when it comes to keeping private information private. Companies should:

 

 

• Tell you when the government is asking for your information so that you can protect yourself;
  • Disclose how often they share information with the government;
  • Stand up for user privacy in the courts and in Congress. Most urgently, companies should advocate for an update to the outdated Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) which was passed in 1986, before the Internet as we know it today even existed.

 

 

Americans shouldn’t have to choose between new technology and keeping their personal information private. Protections for online privacy are justified and necessary, and the government must help draw boundaries to ensure that Americans’ privacy stays intact in the Digital Age.