Transición hacia una Internet censurada. Y mientras, en el cortijo...

[Mad Men]

Suena a globo sonda. No me puedo creer que no tengan informáticos lo bastante competentes para romper la encripción de whatsapp, pero ahí va por si acaso.

United Kingdom is set to ban popular mobile messaging application, WhatsApp, under new strict laws on social media and online messaging services.
British Prime Minister David Cameron pressing ahead with new legislation which plans to stop people from sending any form of encrypted messages. If the law is passed all online messaging services which scramble communications between their users could be banned.
Earlier this year, Cameron said, “In our country, do we want to allow a means of communication between people which we cannot read? My answer to that question is: ‘No, we must not’.”

Por cierto, Cameron dice bien clarito que quiere saber todo lo que hablamos entre nosotros y que para él la privacidad no existe. ¿Es el mismo que se presenta como adalid de las libertades británicas contra la opresión de la Unión Europea?

http://tribune.com.pk/story/918323/uk-to-ban-whatsapp-within-weeks/

Los anglos y nórdicos llevan años queriendo profundizar en la idea de transparencia. Para garantizar una verdadera democracia, todo debe ser transparente. Todo debe conocerse y lo que prima es el derecho a saber.

En cambio, en la Europa germánica (Alemania, Austria, Suiza), lo que prima es el derecho a la privacidad. Poned el google maps y vereis que solo quedan Austria, grandes partes de Alemania y la Suiza germana sin haber sido fotografiada hasta el último detalle por el Street View.

A mí me parece lógico, por historia a ningún británico se le ocurre que se pueda utilizar mal sus datos. En cambio en Alemania, en fin... no hace falta hablar.

Yo en esto estoy con los germanos. Ya sé que hacen trampas y en verdad estamos más controlados de lo que creemos, pero al menos ponen límites.

La transparencia y la democracia nunca han sido el ideal de los Germanos,eso sí, hacen mucho hincapié en la técnica y el control burocrático.  Los nórdicos nunca han visto con buenos ojos a los Germanos, los consideran hostiles (y con razón). Es innegable que tienen sus virtudes, pero no entiendo esas alabanzas que oigo, en muchos aspectos me dan repelús incluso. 

[lectorhinfluyente1984]

Suena a globo sonda. No me puedo creer que no tengan informáticos lo bastante competentes para romper la encripción de whatsapp, pero ahí va por si acaso.

United Kingdom is set to ban popular mobile messaging application, WhatsApp, under new strict laws on social media and online messaging services.
British Prime Minister David Cameron pressing ahead with new legislation which plans to stop people from sending any form of encrypted messages. If the law is passed all online messaging services which scramble communications between their users could be banned.
Earlier this year, Cameron said, “In our country, do we want to allow a means of communication between people which we cannot read? My answer to that question is: ‘No, we must not’.”

Por cierto, Cameron dice bien clarito que quiere saber todo lo que hablamos entre nosotros y que para él la privacidad no existe. ¿Es el mismo que se presenta como adalid de las libertades británicas contra la opresión de la Unión Europea?

http://tribune.com.pk/story/918323/uk-to-ban-whatsapp-within-weeks/

Los anglos y nórdicos llevan años queriendo profundizar en la idea de transparencia. Para garantizar una verdadera democracia, todo debe ser transparente. Todo debe conocerse y lo que prima es el derecho a saber.

En cambio, en la Europa germánica (Alemania, Austria, Suiza), lo que prima es el derecho a la privacidad. Poned el google maps y vereis que solo quedan Austria, grandes partes de Alemania y la Suiza germana sin haber sido fotografiada hasta el último detalle por el Street View.

A mí me parece lógico, por historia a ningún británico se le ocurre que se pueda utilizar mal sus datos. En cambio en Alemania, en fin... no hace falta hablar.

Yo en esto estoy con los germanos. Ya sé que hacen trampas y en verdad estamos más controlados de lo que creemos, pero al menos ponen límites.

En mi humilde opinión, creo que es justo al revés. El derecho a la privacidad (también de los datos) era bastante más fuerte y sólido en la tradición histórica anglosajona.

Otra cosa es que U.S.A. se está terminando de convertir en Imperio y el Ejecutivo está alcanzando poderes que nunca jamás había tenido, ya fue así a partir de la Gran Depresión, luego con la creación del F.B.I., ahora tenemos la Patriot Act. Pero partían de un derecho a la privacidad y limitación republicana del Estado mucho más desarrollado que los alemanes siglos XIX y XX.

[españavabien]

Suena a globo sonda. No me puedo creer que no tengan informáticos lo bastante competentes para romper la encripción de whatsapp, pero ahí va por si acaso.

United Kingdom is set to ban popular mobile messaging application, WhatsApp, under new strict laws on social media and online messaging services.
British Prime Minister David Cameron pressing ahead with new legislation which plans to stop people from sending any form of encrypted messages. If the law is passed all online messaging services which scramble communications between their users could be banned.
Earlier this year, Cameron said, “In our country, do we want to allow a means of communication between people which we cannot read? My answer to that question is: ‘No, we must not’.”

Por cierto, Cameron dice bien clarito que quiere saber todo lo que hablamos entre nosotros y que para él la privacidad no existe. ¿Es el mismo que se presenta como adalid de las libertades británicas contra la opresión de la Unión Europea?

http://tribune.com.pk/story/918323/uk-to-ban-whatsapp-within-weeks/

Los anglos y nórdicos llevan años queriendo profundizar en la idea de transparencia. Para garantizar una verdadera democracia, todo debe ser transparente. Todo debe conocerse y lo que prima es el derecho a saber.

En cambio, en la Europa germánica (Alemania, Austria, Suiza), lo que prima es el derecho a la privacidad. Poned el google maps y vereis que solo quedan Austria, grandes partes de Alemania y la Suiza germana sin haber sido fotografiada hasta el último detalle por el Street View.

A mí me parece lógico, por historia a ningún británico se le ocurre que se pueda utilizar mal sus datos. En cambio en Alemania, en fin... no hace falta hablar.

Yo en esto estoy con los germanos. Ya sé que hacen trampas y en verdad estamos más controlados de lo que creemos, pero al menos ponen límites.

En mi humilde opinión, creo que es justo al revés. El derecho a la privacidad (también de los datos) era bastante más fuerte y sólido en la tradición histórica anglosajona.

Otra cosa es que U.S.A. se está terminando de convertir en Imperio y el Ejecutivo está alcanzando poderes que nunca jamás había tenido, ya fue así a partir de la Gran Depresión, luego con la creación del F.B.I., ahora tenemos la Patriot Act. Pero partían de un derecho a la privacidad y limitación republicana del Estado mucho más desarrollado que los alemanes siglos XIX y XX.

Sí, historicamente es así pero hoy en día no, "gracias" a la experiencia alemana en el siglo XX.

Otro movimiento a estar atentos en Alemania es el cada vez mayor uso que se hace de la democracia directa a nivel local, un movimiento influenciado por la democracia suiza.

[muyuu]

http://www.forbes.com/sites/theopriestley/2015/07/18/apple-ads-based-on-your-credit-balance-pushes-privacy-beyond-the-limit/

Una patente de Apple para mostrar anuncios distintos según tu saldo en iTunes/ApplePay.   

[wanderer]

http://www.forbes.com/sites/theopriestley/2015/07/18/apple-ads-based-on-your-credit-balance-pushes-privacy-beyond-the-limit/

Una patente de Apple para mostrar anuncios distintos según tu saldo en iTunes/ApplePay.   

Yo lo agradecería: por cuanto más pobre pase, mejor (aunque claro, lo mejor sería capar toda la publicidad, cara o barata).

¿Para cuándo una app estilo adblock plus para Android, Windows Phone y Apple?? 

[muyuu]

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/07/crypto-wars-have-gone-global

JULY 28, 2015 | BY SARAH MYERS WEST

The Crypto Wars Have Gone Global

Recently, Congress heard testimony about whether or not backdoors should be introduced into encryption technologies, a technically problematic proposal that would fundamentally weaken the security of the Internet, according to a recent report written by eleven of the world’s leading cryptographers. But while Congress is reliving these debates from the nineties (we hear they’re in these days), the Crypto Wars are very much alive and well in other parts of the world.

The United Kingdom, Netherlands and Australia have gone farther than the proposals put forward by the FBI by introducing new regulations that seek to weaken and place limits on the development and use of encryption. These efforts, made ostensibly to protect citizens against terrorism, are likely to have severe economic, political and social consequences for these nations and their citizens, while doing little to protect their security.

According to the cryptographers’ report, encryption in fact has a critical role to play in national security by protecting citizens against malicious threats. The harm to the public that can be presented by lax digital security has been illustrated a number of times over recent months: data breaches such as the hack of the Office of Personnel Management compromised the personal information of tens of millions of Americans, while weak or flawed cryptography led to vulnerabilities such as Logjam and FREAK that compromised the transport layer security protocols used to secure network connections worldwide. Encryption is not only essential to protecting free expression in the digital age—it's also a critical part of national security.

This is what makes law enforcement claims that encryption prevents them from pursuing criminals and terrorists so concerning, especially when it’s not backed up by evidence. Testimony by Manhattan’s DA before the Senate Judiciary Committee revealed that the office had encountered 74 iPhones whose full-disk encryption had hindered an investigation, or less than 0.1% of all cases, as EFF’s Nadia Kayyali notes. As Bruce Schneier put it recently in an interview, “[David] Cameron is unlikely to demand that cars redesign their engines so as to limit their speeds to 60 kph so bank robbers can’t get away so fast. But he doesn’t understand the comparable trade-offs in his proposed legislation."

United Kingdom

Cameron has said there should be no “means of communication” which “we cannot read” in the United Kingdom, which has been interpreted by some media outlets as a proposal to ban the use of encryption in the UK.

No legislation has been made available publicly yet, and a spokesperson for the prime minister backed off such claims in recent days, so the exact form of implementation remains to be seen. But to entertain the hypothetical, the consequences of such a move would be quite significant: not only would UK citizens be banned from using secure software and UK companies be banned from producing it, but any sort of free and open source software would be banned, due to an inability to police whether encryption had been introduced in any of the code.

A ban would likely mean, as Cory Doctorow notes, that many companies would have to relocate or completely revamp their servers as operating systems like GNU/Linux and BSD use free and open source code. Popular messaging applications including iMessage and WhatsApp would be banned for their use of encryption. Moreover, anyone entering the UK with a phone or computer from outside of the UK would have to conform to UK standards or have their devices seized at the border.

But the likely proposal, that Cameron will seek to mandate technology companies provide backdoor access to UK law enforcement, is already having a negative impact on UK businesses. A number of technology firms, including Ghost, Ind.ie and Eris Industries, have moved out of the UK over concerns they will be forced to introduce backdoors in their encryption technologies. Leading technology companies including Apple and Google have also expressed trepidation at the UK’s planned expansion of its state power over their products.

The consequences for users’ privacy are even worse. Parliament is expected to revive the Draft Communications Data Bill, commonly known as the Snoopers’ Charter, in its next session. The bill would require Internet service providers to maintain records of users’ communications and would change authorization procedures to allow senior law enforcement officers to give monthly authorizations for bulk collection rather than requiring individual requests for the collection of data.

In combination with a mandate for backdoored encryption, this would mean a dramatic expansion of the UK’s capacity to surveil the communications and metadata of its citizens even as the state diminishes those citizens’ capacity to protect themselves from harm.

The Netherlands

The Netherlands is similarly considering legislation that would combine an expansion in surveillance powers with limits on cryptography in a slightly different form, through the capacity to compel decryption of data. It recently launched public consultation on a proposed update to the Intelligence & Security Act of 2002 which expands the country’s surveillance capabilities to include non-specific interception. In combination with intelligence services’ existing authority to compel anyone to decrypt stored data and communications either by handing over keys or by providing the decrypted data, citizens of the Netherlands face significant incursions on their privacy.

Mandating end-users decrypt their data is in many ways problematic, particularly because it reverses the presumption of guilt. If the user doesn’t have the private key or passphrase to access the decrypted data, there is no way for them to prove this is the case—and they could face felony or misdemeanor charges for their failure to comply.

But the mandate to decrypt also includes other parties, including intermediaries and online service providers, which would introduce another complicated twist. According to analysis of the bill by Matthijs Koot, this provision is written in such a way as to facilitate bulk interception of encrypted communications where mandated by a Minister. The existing law already grants legal room for the use of hacking, which could be used in order to obtain the information necessary to decrypt data, or using third party agents or informants in order to obtain this information, for example by intercepting someone’s keys in order to decrypt their data—all of which would present greater challenges to protecting user privacy.

There’s still time for these provisions to be amended in response to public comments. The Dutch Review Committee on the Intelligence & Security Services has already raised a number of important questions about the bill, including whether the expansion of interception powers will be effective and necessary, how the privacy of innocent citizens should be protected and what the minimum requirements of oversight should be. We’re hopeful that critique will also come from within Parliament, given that Dutch representatives opposed similar measures when proposed by the Council of Europe in January, according to EDRi. But the proposal of such measures is indicative of a range of challenges to encryption broader than UK and US-proposed backdoors.

Australia

Recently passed revisions of Australia’s Defence Trade Controls Act may likewise have a deleterious effect on the development and use of encryption technologies. The DTCA is a permitting regime that regulates trade in military technologies and dual-use technologies, including encryption. The newest list of these technologies introduces the risk of overbreadth by setting an extremely low bar for what forms of encryption classify under this regime—regulating not only encryption software itself, but the systems, electronics and encryption used to implement, develop, produce and test it.

All it takes is for such an ambiguously-written regulation to be re-interpreted or over-enforced, and a country with an apparently positive approach to strong encryption could quickly morph into a state that silences or even prosecutes its own security researchers. While such regulations exist on the statute books, statements by politicians declaring their intent to prevent the privacy of encryption contribute to this climate of uncertainty, without any need for a new law.

In this case, the planned introduction of criminal provisions to the Defence Trade Controls Act has raised serious questions about the safety of distributing or even teaching encryption among researchers. Daniel Mathews, a lecturer at Monash University, is concerned that the specifications are so imprecise that “the only cryptography not covered by the DGSL is cryptography so weak that it would be imprudent to use."

Moreover, they risk being interpreted in such a way as to make the teaching of cryptography and even other areas of mathematics illegal without obtaining a permit. The EFF recently signed on to a letter from members of the International Association for Cryptologic Research expressing concern over the law, saying it “subjects many ordinary teaching and research activities to unclear, potentially severe, export controls." The amendments to the Act were passed in April and will come into effect next year.

The Danger of Setting New Norms

The unintended consequence of these efforts to provide law enforcement unfettered access to communications for users’ privacy and the security of the Internet far exceeds the benefits that would be gained.

Even with amendments, the regularity with which these debates occur presents a risk that they begin to set the norm: given the geopolitical weight of the nations in which they’re being considered there’s potential that such proposals could set precedent for other nations to follow suit. And as EFF lawyer Nate Cardozo noted in a panel at the recent Crypto Summit, even more dangerous is the potential for silent capitulation by technology companies regardless of whether there’s a law on the books.

Already, FBI Director James Comey praised the UK’s proposal for being “a little bit ahead of us” on encryption policy in his testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee, suggesting such policy measures are progressive rather than outdated and ill-informed. It’s time to leave the Crypto Wars behind, and treat encryption as a part of national security rather than a threat to it.

[juancoco]

Si fueron capaces de la tontería de las cookies, no será menos con la encriptación abriendo nuevos nichos para encription free countries.

Los estados podrían dar ejemplo liberando toda su información clasificada y haciendo la contabilidad presupuestaria transparente y pública.

[Currobena]

¿Otro ataque más a la privacidad aprovechando la ignorancia informática de la mayoría de la población?

Once again, Microsoft screwed the world with its Windows 10 feature called Wi-Fi Sense. This nasty feature has serious legal implications for it will automatically connect your personal Wi-Fi network to anyone in your e-mail list using HotMail, Skype, or Outlook, and even Facebook, making those friends questionable. If any such person comes within range of your home Wi-Fi, they could secretly access your system from hundreds of yards away.

The real problem with this is rather sinister. The government would no longer need a search warrant for your surrendered privacy; good luck finding a judge who will uphold the rights that exist only in your imagination.

I just saw the new “Terminator” movie. The AI computer that decides to eliminate humankind begins as a system called “Genesis” with exactly the same profile – to connect you to everyone instantly. While I do not believe that we are dealing with such a creature, I do worry about the full Stalinistic powers this provides the government, as this will grant them access to hunt down anyone who dissents from their view. Suddenly, we all become the next Snowden since disagreeing with the government is now TREASON. Such powers are not necessary, and while Windows 10 supposedly allows you to opt-out, this setting is the default – they know what they are doing. The vast majority of people do not understand computers and they will be surrendering all rights to Microsoft without understanding what they have done. Why is Microsoft acting in such a hostile manner towards human rights?

http://www.armstrongeconomics.com/archives/35542

[juancoco]

Estos de Microsoft ya no hayan como suicidarse. Parece mentira que la mejor franquicia de informática que nunca haya existido, hoy día, solo se le ocurran estas cosas. Todo un case study de como una organización se esclerotiza. Que poco han cambiado las cosas desde que a la Western Union le ofrecieron las patentes del teléfono, solo para despreciarlas altivamente.

A la final habrá que pasar por el trauma y aprender esto del Linux.

.......y yo que estoy tan contento con mi XP.

[muyuu]

[muyuu]

http://edition.cnn.com/2015/08/01/opinions/rogers-encryption-security-risk/index.html

"Encryption a growing threat to security"

[saturno]

http://edition.cnn.com/2015/08/01/opinions/rogers-encryption-security-risk/index.html

"Encryption a growing threat to security"

Con el argumento definitivo:

If landlords have the moral responsibility to protect a community from illegal use of their property, shouldn't tech companies have the same moral responsibility to protect the broader online community from illegal use of their property?

Se sostiene sobre la equivalencia USAna de:

Propiedad Intelectual == de naturalez inmobiliaria == es un derecho natural

Con sus dos variantes:
-- Cesión por compraventa de los algoritmos (patentes de ideas)
-- Alquiler por derecho de uso  (p.e. Windows10)

Su consecuencia más eufórica
-- La libertad bajo licencia (licencias "libres")

Y hay que defender la libertad controlando las ideas:
Porque 
América es la expresión politica de la tierra de libertad
el derecho de propiedad es expresión (la completa) de la libre empresa
y el way of life expresión (registrable) de la idea misma de libertad.

Vaya artículo. Eso no lo escribe un individuo.
Es un trabajo de equipo entre varios expertos en propaganda.

[El afilador]

http://edition.cnn.com/2015/08/01/opinions/rogers-encryption-security-risk/index.html

"Encryption a growing threat to security"

¡Qué barbaridad!

Guerra es Paz,
Libertad es Esclavitud,
Ignorancia es Fuerza.

[Currobena]

Más sobre corrupción y espionaje usando la informática, y de cómo destruyen el comercio y la prosperidad internacionales.

NSA: A Tax & Economics Espionage Agency  Posted on August 4, 2015  by  Martin Armstrong       

Anyone who thinks this is about terrorism is pathetically naive. The NSA is a top-notch Tax & Economic Espionage (TEE) organization; with terrorism so low on the agenda, it is laughable. You do not collect every phone call worldwide of billions of people to sort out even 100 terrorists. They store all that data and can input your name and wham – up pops everything. I am waiting for some smart lawyer in a divorce case to subpoena such a file to prove someone has been cheating to get a pile of money.
 

In theory, the existence of such files should be open to everyone just like the Nixon Tapes. They must have copies of all the emails Hillary erased to hide her dealings with foreign governments to get money for the pretend Clinton charity. They all exist. Why has someone not demanded that the NSA turn them over? Well, it would open the floodgate on everyone else. The NSA didn’t build that immense storage facility for nothing. They erase nothing – retain everything. They remembered their childhood songs of how Santa Claus knows everything and said gee, we can do that. So why is Congress or even Trump demanding the NSA turnover all her emails? Guess to they do not want to publicly admit Snowden was correct.
The NSA is a strategically aligned intelligence agency that has brought “1984” to life. The NSA has been deeply engaged in economic and industrial espionage. Combating terrorism, global money laundering, corruptions, and the fight against proliferation, are all excuses used to justify tracking every dollar. They might as well put a GPS chip in the currency. Terrorism is just a fig leaf for what they have been building. If they were interested in just terrorism, they would have no need to store every phone call, email, text, and written letter they can get their hands on.
New revelations claim that the NSA was spying on the French military industry, what they were producing, and to whom they were selling. Due to restrictive granting of export permits imposed by Germany, the German armaments industry is blocked. The French defense industry can count on the support of their government to ship to foreign lands. This is what distinguishes the French key industries from their German competitors. This has made the French military industry an interesting target for the NSA. This we can understand, but going beyond that opens Pandora’s Box.
The key to understanding the NSA’s mission profile for economic and industrial espionage began when the dividing line for “national security” expanded following 9/11. This has become a paradigm shift where everything from money flows, transport, energy, telecommunications, critical infrastructure, and the IT sector, has been designed to track and control eventually everything. The gathering of information is only one part of a much broader intelligence operation. They are operating in secret, not even Congress knows what they are really doing with the data. Snowden reported that staff created programs to collect nude photos that girls sent to their boyfriends, which certainly had nothing to do with national security.
This is especially true when it comes to long-term, strategic economic goals. The French newspaper “Libération” recently reported that around 100 major French companies, including almost all of the members of the Paris stock exchange CAC 40 index, will be affected by NSA spying activities. The NSA is probably tracking all German companies since they would be even more critical, given the German export economic model. The economic ties between German politics and economics contain politically interesting export markets, such as Russia or China, represents extremely valuable info regarding even the embargo against Russia.
However, there is a significant difference between the French and German key industries: German DAX companies were listed often on the U.S. stock market, whereas a French company was not. After the investigations in the course of compliance bribery scandal against Siemens unfolded, rethinking began within German industry with respect to U.S. listings. DAX companies such as Daimler (2010), the German Telekom, and even before the Alliance, BASF, Bayer, Infineon, and E.ON have retired for good reasons from the U.S. market. Siemens followed in early 2014.
Unbeknownst to most people, the Patriot Act (2001) imposed administrative requirements. The SEC obtained new compliance powers for any company traded on the U.S. stock exchange. This has resulted in many foreign companies de-listing from the USA in a mass exodus. Listing on the U.S. exchange opened the door for the NSA and other security authorities (FBI) to engage in investigations and control beyond the U.S. borders, expanding even the FBI outside the USA all in the name of terrorism. This has led to the mass exit of foreign companies from U.S. listings.
Foreign banks exposed themselves to U.S. law, even in their home offices, by merely having an office in the USA. The U.S. authorities went after and destroyed the Swiss banks by imposing all sorts of charges. This is why UBS suddenly donated to Hillary’s charity in return for her intervening on their behalf. That is outright criminal bribery, but Hillary seems to think she walks on water.
An example of a ZDF-post on May 17, 2000, shows that the NSA spied on German companies for the benefit of American companies. “The most spectacular case is probably the case of VW, where the NSA from this station has intercepted video conferencing from VW with the later manager Lopez while then, the results in the United States General Motors and then leaked to the German subsidiary Opel.” The U.S. intelligence is abusing their power for private purposes. One must wonder what the U.S. companies gave in return for such assistance. This was just the tip of the iceberg.
Systemically, the NSA has been spying on foreign banks, looking for Americans at least since the mid-90s. This includes Switzerland, Liechtenstein, and Luxembourg. This transformed into claiming they were concerned about financing terrorism, which would not take billions of dollars. In addition, the IT used by the banks has been ineffective in blocking access by the NSA.
The NSA has developed a massive means to follow the cash flows as supported by the documents of Edward Snowden. The involvement of the NSA in tracking all capital flows is documented in the global monitoring of payments, including all banks. The documents showed also that the Belgium-based SWIFT organization was an NSA intelligence target. SWIFT standardizes the remittances of the world for more than 10,000 banks and is considered a bottleneck for international payments. Tap into that and you have everything.
This activity has contributed to the DEFLATIONARY world we live in as capital flows have reduced because of crazy regulation. FATCA has prevented Americans from operating overseas. Only prior multinational are exempt. No American citizen can possibly expand into the world economy for foreign banks will not accept Americans, be it in Asia or Europe. This is the hunt for money to document every account and movement of money. This is reducing global capital flows and threatens to unwind everything that was built since World War II. Foreign companies have been delisted in the USA because of crazy regulation hidden inside the Patriot Act, and then add FATCA, and one must wonder how much longer the world economy can stand before it topples over.

http://www.armstrongeconomics.com/archives/35624

[muyuu]

http://cybersecuritycaucus.com/homeland-security-new-cybersecurity-bill-to-sweep-away-internet-privacy/

Homeland Security: New Cybersecurity Bill to ‘Sweep Away’ Internet Privacy

The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said a controversial new surveillance bill under consideration in the Senate could “sweep away important privacy protections.”

The Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act (CISA) would offer legal protection to companies that monitor their customers and share information about “cyber threats indicators” with any federal entity.
In response to a July query from Senator Al Franken, DHS Deputy Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said some provisions of the bill “could sweep away important privacy protections” and that the proposed legislation “raises privacy and civil liberties concerns.”

The DHS fears that the bill’s “expansive definitions of cyber threat indicators” would also permit companies to share data unrelated to cyber threats, Mayorkas added.

CISA’s supporters say it would help the public and private sector defend against cyberattacks. But privacy advocates are concerned the bill would allow companies to hand over customers’personal data to government intelligence agencies.

Franken, the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Privacy, Technology and the Law, said CISA is not yet ready for a vote.

“The Department of Homeland Security’s letter makes it overwhelmingly clear that, if the Senate moves forward with this cybersecurity information-sharing bill, we are at risk of sweeping away important privacy protections and civil liberties, and we would actually increase the difficulty and complexity of information sharing, undermining our nation’s cybersecurity objectives,” he said in a statement.

The DHS has established information sharing arrangements that CISA might weaken, it said.

“If cyber threat indicators are distributed amongst multiple agencies rather than initially provided through one entity, the complexity – for both government and businesses – and inefficiency of any information sharing program will markedly increase; developing a single, comprehensive picture of the range of cyber threats faced daily will become more difficult,” Mayorkas wrote.

The result will actually reduce the government’s ability combat potential hackers, he said.

“This will limit the ability of DHS to connect the dots and proactively recognize emerging risks and help private and public organizations implement effective mitigations to reduce the likelihood of damaging incidents.”

On Tuesday, Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Kentucky Republican, said he wanted to bring CISA to the Senate floor for a vote before a month-long recess starts at the end of the week, the Washington Times reported.

But Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, Nevada Democrat, said his party would only let the bill proceed if his members get an opportunity to offer relevant amendments.

View the original content and more from this author here:  http://sputniknews.com/us/20150805/1025403215.html#ixzz3hw3qlC3R