This week, Congress is expected to vote on a bill that would update key federal surveillance authorities. The legislation has been packaged by its pro

Lawmakers Are Kicking Warrantless Wiretapping Into Overdrive

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2024-04-23 14:30:11

This week, Congress is expected to vote on a bill that would update key federal surveillance authorities. The legislation has been packaged by its proponents as a reform but is, in reality, an attempt to vastly expand the government’s spying powers, privacy advocates say.

H.R. 7888, or the Reforming Intelligence and Securing America Act , would renew key surveillance powers enjoyed by the U.S. intelligence community, broadly known as Section 702.

Section 702 was created in 2008 as part of the FISA Amendments Act , which gave the government the legal authority to conduct warrantless surveillance of Americans who communicate with people outside of the country. The law allows the U.S. intelligence community (most notably the NSA ) to conduct “targeted surveillance” of people outside the U.S. with the “compelled assistance of electronic communication service providers,” when a government court deems it necessary for national security reasons.

While the government has said that this surveillance activity is targeted exclusively at non-Americans, the law has repeatedly allowed large amounts of Americans’ communications to become ensnared in the government’s net . As the Brennan Center, a legal nonprofit associated with NYU, has put it, Section 702 has become a “go-to domestic spying” tool that is used to “conduct hundreds of thousands of warrantless ‘backdoor’ searches for Americans’ private communications every year.”