Title : ‘Zero checks & balances: Americans being swept up in massive surveillance net’
link : ‘Zero checks & balances: Americans being swept up in massive surveillance net’
‘Zero checks & balances: Americans being swept up in massive surveillance net’
| RT | Sep 13, 2017 |
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The Trump administration is calling on Congress to reauthorize a surveillance law, which is due to expire at the end of the year.
Moreover, Attorney General Jeff Sessions and National Intelligence Director Dan Coats on Monday asked Congress in a letter to reauthorize a section of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) scheduled to expire at the end of the year.
The letter, which can be read here, argues that Section 702 of FISA "produces significant foreign intelligence that is vital to protect the nation against international terrorism and other threats."
Critics, however, say the FISA provisions, which Sessions and Coats want to see made permanent, are steadily eroding civil rights.
RT: If this surveillance law is reauthorized, what will it mean for everyday people?
Russ Baker: My concern here regarding FISA (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act) is that it was originally established in 1978 as a protection against abuses that were being committed by representatives of the US government. Over the years, this law has been turned around to itself become a vehicle for abuses. And we’ve seen tremendous ones. We also saw, for example, under President George W. Bush they violated the provision that they could not go after alleged terrorist organizations without getting a court order. They went right ahead, and they did that, and there were no serious repercussions. Now, as I understand, what they’d like to do is make this law permanent. So we’re seeing a constant degrading of the protections of the rights of Americans, whether they are in the US or they’re traveling abroad because they’ve created this tremendous net. Since 2001, it has been expanded to create all manner of electronic communications. Ostensibly this is only supposed to be targeting foreigners. But, for example, I am speaking to you – they could be targeting you. You could be on some kind of list as a foreign organization, and therefore I am getting swept up even though I am an American citizen.
RT: Officials say the act is vital to national security. Why are so many people worried about it then?
Russ Baker: They’re worried because you have to have safeguards in place. A lot of these things are based on somebody’s judgment, what is considered to be a terrorist, a problem for a country. A lot of these things are very, very subjective because it depends on the values of the administration that is in power. We also have seen these abuses – for example, they can go to a telephone company and ask them to turn over all of their call records with the notion that this is sweeping up these foreign communication. So the potential for abuse is absolutely unlimited.
I want to point out that even the part of FISA that supposedly does control abuses, where they require a court order, and that is only in certain cases, it is quite staggering to learn that the court itself, they are all appointed by one person, Chief Justice John Roberts. He basically appoints whoever he wants. There are no checks and balances. I know that Congressional Intelligence Committee themselves have expressed real concern about this.
Read more at RT..
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