Two Senate bills, 773 and 778, introduced by Democratic Senator Jay Rockefeller and Republican Olympia Snowe would, if passed, give the federal government virtually unrestricted control over the Internet, including private-sector Internet services, applications, and services.
The Cybersecurity Act of 2009 (PDF) gives the president the ability to “declare a cybersecurity emergency” and shut down or limit Internet traffic in any “critical” information network “in the interest of national security.” The bill does not define a critical information network or a cybersecurity emergency. That definition would be left to the president.
The bill does not only add to the power of the president. It also grants the Secretary of Commerce “access to all relevant data concerning [critical] networks without regard to any provision of law, regulation, rule, or policy restricting such access.” This means he or she can monitor or access any data on private or public networks without regard to privacy laws. …
Jennifer Granick, civil liberties director at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, says that granting such power to the Commerce secretary could actually cause networks to be less safe. When one person can access all information on a network, “it makes it more vulnerable to intruders,” Granick says. “You’ve basically established a path for the bad guys to skip down.”
The bill’s scope, she says, is “contrary to what the Constitution promises us.”
I’m all in favor of increasing cybersecurity but clearly not at this cost. The Obama administration already has proved it has no qualms about removing executives from private sector companies, despite having absolutely no constitutional authority to do so. If this bill were to pass as-is, what’s to stop the White House from seizing control of AT&T, Verizon, and other ISPs and dictating what information is allowed and not allowed to pass over their networks? As it stands now, nothing.
And you thought the Bush-era NSA wiretapping was bad.
Previously:
Privacy and free speech in an online world
‘Great Firewall’ coming to Australia. Is the U.S. next?
Stimulus bill includes medical databases for ‘biosurveillance’
