Two proposals to revamp National Security Agency phone...

Two proposals to revamp National Security Agency phone surveillance law brought mixed reactions Tuesday, with details of the proposals still unfolding. Initial media reports emerged of a White House proposal, expected to be formally released by the end of the week (CD Jan 21 p1), and House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers, R-Mich., and ranking member Dutch Ruppersberger, D-Md., announced details of their legislation at a media briefing Tuesday. Their bill is called the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act Transparency and Modernization Act. That bill has 11 co-sponsors from both parties, Rogers and Ruppersberger said in a news release. They emphasized that it would require individualized judicial review, and that the government could query the communications companies for a number’s associations if it has “reasonable and articulable suspicion” of terrorism associations. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court would have to keep Congress informed of any significant opinions, one provision of the bill said. Another would create a “privacy advocate” before the FISC. Both proposals are expected to move bulk phone metadata storage away from the government and into the hands of the phone companies, but without retention mandates. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., author of the USA Freedom Act, said he welcomed the news of President Barack Obama’s proposal. “In the meantime, the President could end bulk collection once and for all on Friday by not seeking reauthorization of this program,” Leahy said. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court order authorizing phone surveillance expires Friday and would have to be renewed, if surveillance were to continue. The USA Freedom Act’s House author, Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., issued a statement calling the House Intelligence proposal “convoluted” and said it “accepts the administration’s deliberate misinterpretation of the law,” ultimately falling short of his own surveillance overhaul. Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., called Obama’s plan “a worthy effort” and said she plans a hearing on both the White House proposal and the House Intelligence bill. The Center for Democracy & Technology in a statement called both proposals “flawed.” “The Ruppersberger bill would end bulk collection for most types of data, but the bill would allow intelligence agencies to obtain individuals’ data without prior court approval,” CDT Senior Counsel Harley Geiger said (http://bit.ly/1jDl9bB). “The President’s proposal, as described, would require intelligence agencies to get court approval before obtaining phone records, but the Obama proposal is only limited to phone records.” The Electronic Frontier Foundation called both proposals “good news” but said details are still lacking. EFF’s blog post (http://bit.ly/1gWePYY) suggested the USA Freedom Act would be better than either. The ACLU called the White House proposal “a crucial first step” but the House Intelligence Committee is “on the wrong track,” Legislative Counsel Michelle Richardson said in a statement (http://bit.ly/1fYlZvU). “Its new bill uses reform momentum as a pretext for expanding government power. The bill’s modest improvements to the phone records program are not worth demolishing the important judicial role in overseeing these programs.”