Despite Amendments, CISPA Remains Fatally Flawed

Cybersecurity Legislation Still Allows Companies to Share People’s Personal Information with National Security Agency

April 11, 2013

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: (212) 549-2666; media@aclu.org

WASHINGTON – The House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence yesterday amended the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act. After review of the amendments adopted by the committee, the American Civil Liberties Union continues to oppose the CISPA bill.

“The changes to the bill don’t address the major privacy problems we have been raising about CISPA for almost a year and a half,” said Michelle Richardson, legislative counsel at the ACLU’s Washington Legislative Office. “CISPA still permits companies to share sensitive and personal customer information with the government and allows the National Security Agency to collect the internet records of everyday Americans. The bill continues to do so even though the NSA maintains it does not want nor need that power and cybersecurity experts tell lawmakers that sharing personal information will not protect critical infrastructure from intrusion and attack.”

The full House of Representatives is expected to vote on CISPA sometime next week. The ACLU urges lawmakers to oppose CISPA and President Obama to threaten to veto the legislation as he did last Congress.

For a detailed analysis of CISPA, please visit: aclu.org/blog/tag/cispa-explainer

For more information on the ACLU’s work on cybersecurity, please visit: aclu.org/cybersecurity