Press release from the National Center for Public Policy Research: National Center Adjunct Fellow Horace Cooper is condemning the decision by the Obama Administration to bypass Congress and implement its automobile “black box” mandate administratively. The Department of Transportation has announced a proposed rule to require Event Data Recorders (EDRs) in 100% of all light vehicles sold in…
Category: U.S.
Stop Congress from Reauthorizing the FISA Amendments Act, a Warrantless Spying Bill
Rainey Reitman writes: We could be celebrating the New Year by ripping out the fiber optic cables that are sending copies of all our emails to the National Security Agency. But instead, Congress is planning on ringing in 2013 by re-authorizing parts of the FISA Amendments Act, the controversial 2008 bill that allows Americans speaking…
State Secrets Front and Center in Dragnet Surveillance Case
David Kravets reports: A federal judge on Friday is to hold the first hearing following an appellate court’s decision reinstating allegations that the government is siphoning Americans’ communications from telecoms to the National Security Agency without warrants. The new judge on the case, U.S. District Judge Jeffrey White of San Francisco, isn’t so sure the…
5th Circuit Rules That Cell Phones Are Not “Facilities” Under SCA
Mali Friedman writes: Yesterday the Fifth Circuit ruled in Garcia v. City of San Laredo that personal cell phones are not “facilities” under the Stored Communications Act (SCA), agreeing with a growing number of courts that have reached the same conclusion. In reaching this decision, the court rejected the claim of plaintiff Garcia, a former police dispatcher for the…