Electronic Frontier Foundation Files Comments on FBI Plan
Washington, D.C. - The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF)
today submitted comments to the Federal Communications
Commission opposing an FBI proposal that would extend a
decade-old telephone surveillance law to the Internet. The
Communication Assistance for Law Enforcement Act of 1994
(CALEA) forced telecommunications carriers like your phone
company to build convenient wiretap features into their
networks. Congress never intended CALEA's requirements to
reach the Internet, but now the FBI is demanding that
broadband ISPs build "wiretappability" into their equipment
too.
"The FBI has made it clear that they don't want to
understand how the Internet is fundamentally different from
the public phone service," said EFF Staff Technologist Chris
Palmer. "The rapid innovation and open access that makes the
Internet great will be severely hampered if creators have to
get past the FCC and FBI every time they want to make an
innovative product."
EFF Staff Attorney Lee Tien continued, "The FBI's plan to
turn the FCC into the 'Federal Bureau of Innovation Control'
will be terribly expensive for everyone involved - except
the FBI. The FCC, Internet service providers, equipment
builders and broadband consumers are being set up to
subsidize the FBI's surveillance state."
EFF's comments were filed in response to an FBI rulemaking
proposal to the FCC.
For this release:
http://www.eff.org/news/breaking/archives/2004_04.php#001412
EFF comments:
http://www.eff.org/Privacy/Surveillance/20040413_EFF_CALEA_comments.php
More information on surveillance:
http://www.eff.org/Privacy/Surveillance/
Related Issues: Privacy
