Tech Companies Urge House, Senate to Support Passage of ECPA Amendments Act

More than 60 companies and organizations signed a letter to Senate Judiciary Chairman Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, ranking member Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., House Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., and ranking member John Conyers, D-Mich., Thursday, urging them to support an update to the Electronic Communications Privacy Act. The ECPA Amendments Act would “provide stronger protection to sensitive personal and proprietary communications stored in ‘the cloud,'” said the letter. Signers included Amazon, Google, the Software & Information Industry Association, TechFreedom, U.S. Chamber of Commerce and Yahoo. The legislation is expected to be introduced in the next few weeks and would require the government to obtain a warrant before requiring a service provider to “disclose the content of emails, texts or other private material stored by the service provider,” said the letter. It said the technology entities believe the requirement of a warrant grants “greater privacy protections” to the American public and creates a “more level playing field for technology.” The ECPA update didn't pass last Congress because authorities want to be able to access customer documents and communications without having to first get a warrant, said the letter. The organizations warned that by failing to pass the legislation again, Congress is sending a message that “privacy protections are lacking in law enforcement access to user information and that constitutional values are imperiled in a digital world.” ECPA update backers have called the initiative a multiyear effort (see 1407140033).