washingtonpost.com: Bush Signs Into Law New Enforcement Era\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n<\/p>
\nBush Signs Into Law New Enforcement Era<\/b>\n
U.S. Gets Broad Electronic Powers\n<\/p>
By Jonathan Krim and Robert O'Harrow Jr.
\nWashington Post Staff Writers
\n\nSaturday, October 27, 2001; Page A06 \n\n<\/p>
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President Bush yesterday handed law enforcement broad new\r\ninvestigative and surveillance powers, signing legislation aimed at helping\r\nauthorities track and disrupt the operations of suspected terrorists in the\r\nUnited States.<\/p>
\"Today, we take an essential step in defeating terrorism\r\nwhile protecting the constitutional rights of all Americans,\" Bush said at\r\na White House ceremony. \"This government will enforce this law with all the\r\nurgency of a nation at war.\"<\/p>
The new law gives the government a freer\r\nhand to conduct searches, detain or deport suspects, eavesdrop on Internet\r\ncommunication, monitor financial transactions and obtain electronic records\r\nof individuals. At the same time, it reduces the need for subpoenas, court\r\norders or other legal checks to enable law enforcement to move more quickly.\r\nConvinced that the steps were necessary, Congress overwhelmingly approved\r\nthe legislation this week.<\/p>
The government is moving aggressively on\r\na number of technology fronts to more efficiently collect and evaluate information\r\nabout people and their movements as they seek to combat terrorism.<\/p>
\r\nThe Defense Department, for instance, announced this week that it is seeking\r\nproposals from companies on an array of new surveillance products such as\r\nportable polygraph machines and systems that can see through walls at night.<\/p>
\r\nAnd with Attorney General John D. Ashcroft promising an anti-terrorist campaign\r\nreminiscent of the war on organized crime in the days of Al Capone, the FBI\r\nwill increasingly demand personal information held by banks, Internet service\r\nproviders and credit bureaus.<\/p>
In many cases, those businesses will\r\nnot be allowed to tell clients that they have turned over medical, financial\r\nor other personal records to investigators.<\/p>
With new law enforcement\r\npowers to monitor computer use, sometimes without a warrant, Internet users\r\nwill have to decide whether they want to rely more on ways of encrypting\r\ntheir e-mail or otherwise disguising their identities online.<\/p>
And with\r\nnew abilities to share data between federal agencies, including the CIA,\r\nlaw enforcement will be able to build more robust, centralized stores of\r\nintercepted information. The law provides no guidelines for how long such\r\ndata can be kept, or what happens to it after a particular investigation\r\nis concluded.<\/p>
\"It was inevitable that we would have much more data\r\ncollection, more data sharing, more data storing\" as a result of technology,\r\nsaid Jeffery Eisenach, president of the Progress and Freedom Foundation,\r\na conservative think tank. \"And thinking through the privacy implications\r\nof what was happening was fine on a 20-year schedule.\" Now, he said, \"this\r\nmuch broader set of privacy concerns is suddenly upon us.\"<\/p>
After weeks\r\nof struggle on Capitol Hill, civil libertarians lost the argument that the\r\ngovernment will gain too many new police powers to potentially examine the\r\nactivities of innocent individuals and erode personal privacy.<\/p>
Senate\r\nJudiciary Committee Chairman Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.), who helped craft the\r\nlegislation, said the current crisis requires aggressive action. Although\r\nhe expressed concern about giving authorities too much power, Leahy said\r\nhe was satisfied with provisions limiting the duration of some of the new\r\nsurveillance rules to four years, subject to congressional review. Leahy\r\nsaid he expects frequent detailed reports about the expanded use of surveillance.<\/p>
\"They won't get the sunset extended if they're not doing the right thing,\" he said.<\/p>
\r\nThe sunset provision does not apply to all provisions in the bill, and it\r\nwasn't enough to satisfy Sen. Russell D. Feingold (D-Wis.), who cast the\r\nlone vote in the Senate against the legislation on Thursday, a day after\r\nthe House approved it by 356 to 66. \"There have been periods in our nation's\r\nhistory when civil liberties have taken a back seat to what appeared at the\r\ntime to be the legitimate exigencies of war,\" he said on the Senate floor.\r\n\"Our national consciousness still bears the stain and the scars of those\r\nevents: The Alien and Sedition acts, the suspension of habeas corpus during\r\nthe Civil War, the internment of Japanese Americans, German Americans and\r\nItalian Americans during World War II, the blacklisting of supposed communist\r\nsympathizers during the McCarthy era, and the surveillance and harassment\r\nof antiwar protesters, including Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.\"<\/p>
Jonathan\r\nBand, a lawyer specializing in technology issues, said the most troubling\r\nelements of the new law are likely to play out in more subtle ways.<\/p>
\r\nFor example, part of the law enabling expanded monitoring or interception\r\nof online communications defines an eligible suspect not as a terrorist,\r\nbut as a \"trespasser.\" But the definition of trespasser is murky, Band said,\r\ncreating \"a huge civil liberties hole.\"<\/p>
A trespasser can be anyone\r\nwithout authorized access to a machine or network. As a result, Band said,\r\nthe FBI could compel a company, or Internet service provider, to allow it\r\nto monitor communications for someone who violated terms of service agreements,\r\nincluding being late on payments.<\/p>
Or a company could give permission\r\nfor the FBI to monitor an employee's computer use if the person used a company\r\ncomputer to shop online, in violation of company policy.<\/p>
Supporters\r\nof the law say these objections are an overreaction and misinterpret the\r\nintent and consequence of the legislation. \"We've had a lot of these recommendations\r\nfor years,\" said Sen. Jon Kyl, (R-Ariz.). \"They are not radical or new.\"\r\n <\/p>
Band said that businesses, Internet service providers and large employers\r\nare going to have to start thinking: \"They have to come up with a policy\r\non how to deal with these requests. Who makes the decision in the company?\"<\/p>
\r\nMany companies might also need to alter their privacy policies, Band said,\r\nso that their users know in advance how the company would react in such situations.\r\nOtherwise, he said, they could be accused of unfair trade practice for violating\r\ntheir policies.<\/p>
A spokesman for America Online, the online division\r\nof AOL Time Warner Inc., declined to comment on the new law. The company's\r\ncurrent privacy policy states that the company will \"release specific information\r\nabout your account only to comply with valid legal process such as a search\r\nwarrant, subpoena or court order, or in special cases such as a physical\r\nthreat to you or others.\"<\/p>
The new law's requirements that phone companies\r\nand Internet providers turn over customer information and activity to the\r\ngovernment if the case involves suspected terrorism are not subject to the\r\nsunset provisions.<\/p>
Banks, especially those that cater to high net-worth\r\nclients whose privacy is sacrosanct, will be subject to new scrutiny under\r\ntougher money-laundering provisions in the law.<\/p>
And the ability for\r\nthe FBI to get customer information from credit bureaus has been eased, although\r\nfull credit reports still require a court order.<\/p>
Leahy said he doubted\r\nthe legislation would force businesses to rework privacy policies. Businesses\r\nalready have to comply with government subpoenas, he said.<\/p>
\"Like everything else, your records can be subpoenaed,\" Leahy said.<\/p>
\r\nSome in the privacy community believe that expanded surveillance powers will\r\nhave an unintended consequence for the government: increased demand for easy-to-use\r\nencryption products that will make monitoring more difficult.<\/p>
\"The\r\ncommunication networks generally are going to be perceived as more vulnerable\"\r\nto snooping, said David Sobel, general counsel for the Electronic Privacy\r\nInformation Center. <\/p>
Products that integrate encryption capability into e-mail or word processing would be popular, Sobel said.<\/p>
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<\/p>\n© 2001 The Washington Post Company\n
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