Law Commons^™

Cross Border Data Flows: Could Foreign Protectionism Hurt U.S. Jobs?: Hearing Before The Subcomm. On Commerce, Mfg. & Trade Of The H. Comm. On Energy & Commerce, 113th Cong., Sept. 17, 2014 (Statement Of Laura K. Donohue), Laura K. Donohue

Testimony Before Congress

Documents released over the past year detailing the National Security Agency’s telephony metadata collection program and interception of international content under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) directly implicated U.S. high technology companies in government surveillance. The result was an immediate, and detrimental, impact on U.S. firms, the economy, and U.S. national security.

The first Snowden documents, printed June 5, 2013, revealed that the U.S. government had served orders on Verizon, directing the company to turn over telephony metadata under Section 215 of the USA PATRIOT Act. The following day, The Guardian published classified slides detailing how the NSA had …

Continued Oversight Of U.S. Government Surveillance Authorities : Hearing Before The S. Committee On The Judiciary, 113th Cong., December 11, 2013 (Statement By Professor Carrie F. Cordero, Geo. U. L. Center), Carrie F. Cordero

Testimony Before Congress

My views are informed by this up-front perspective regarding how the USA PATRIOT Act of 2001, the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004, and later the FISA Amendments Act of 2008, vastly improved the Intelligence Community’s ability to protect the nation from another attack on the scale of September 11th. More recently, I have had the added benefit of having spent the past three years outside of government to reflect, and to engage with the academic community, and to some extent the public, regarding some of the issues this Committee is considering today.

Continued Oversight Of The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act : Hearing Before The S. Committee On The Judiciary, 113th Cong., October 2, 2013 (Statement By Professor Carrie F. Cordero, Geo. U. L. Center), Carrie F. Cordero

Testimony Before Congress

From my perspective, the challenge for members of this Committee is to identify whether there are actual problems with either the law or process, and then craft remedies that address those specific issues. I am here to urge caution in implementing “quick fixes” that may sound appealing based on public or media-driven pressure, but that could have lasting consequences at a practical level that could negatively impact Intelligence Community operations and the nation’s security for years to come.

Continued Oversight Of The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act : Hearing Before The S. Committee On The Judiciary, 113th Cong., October 2, 2013 (Remarks By Professor Laura K. Donohue, Geo. U. L. Center), Laura K. Donohue

Testimony Before Congress

Congress introduced the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) to make use of new technologies and to enable the intelligence community to obtain information vital to U.S. national security, while preventing the National Security Agency (NSA) and other federal intelligence-gathering entities from engaging in broad domestic surveillance. The legislature sought to prevent a recurrence of the abuses of the 1960s and 1970s that accompanied the Cold War and the rapid expansion in communications technologies.

Congress purposefully circumscribed the NSA’s authorities by limiting them to foreign intelligence gathering. It required that the target be a foreign power or an agent thereof, …