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Senate narrowly rejects plan to require a warrant for Americans’ browsing data
- ejstronge 6y agoIs there a senator who is filibustering this bill? It seems that there were 59 yes votes and four absences - how many nays are there, and who is obstructing this bill?
- ABeeSea 6y agoBernie decided to just not vote even though his vote would have changed the outcome.
- outside1234 6y agoYou have to admit its on brand - just talk - never getting anything done or passed...
- mc32 6y agoIt’s a strange vote. I mean it’s completely bipartisan. And a couple on either side and an independent abstained. Guess there was some good horse trading.
- fzeroracer 6y agoPlease don't spread falsehoods. Bernie's vote wouldn't have mattered unless he voted in favor of the bill, in which case the bill would've passed. An absent vote is the same thing as a nay vote in the Senate. To pass this amendment it requires 60 affirmative votes, of which there were 59.
- filoleg 6y agoSo, if the Bernie voted “yes” (which is consistent with his usual political alignment), then the amendemnt would have passed, right? If yes, then how do you derive “his vote wouldn’t have mattered” from this?
- fzeroracer 6y agoCan you explain how this is consistent with his political alignment? Because Bernie Sanders (regardless of how you feel about him) has voted consistently against increasing the surveillance state. Hence why his vote wouldn't have mattered, because it would've been a NAY vote and NAY votes don't have any affirmative power.
- sterlind 6y agoThe vote is on a plan to REQUIRE a warrant. If he'd voted, he would have voted YEA, to pass this bill requiring a warrant, because he does not want to increase the surveillance state (on that we agree!) It's "yea" for requiring warrants, and "nay" for warrantless surveillance (which is somehow the law of the land now? When did I miss this??)
- dragonwriter 6y agoActually, this is an amendment on a bill to reauthorize expired warrantless surveillance programs, so a yes vote is a vote to make warrants for certain searches a condition for reauthorize broad authority for warrantless dragnet surveillance. I suspect Bernie's abstention is because he thinks reauthorization is equally unacceptable with or without the condition. Procedurally, he could vote yes on the amendment and still vote on the bill, and there's an argument that not doing so is making the perfect the enemy of the good (or at least the barely decent the enemy of the mildly less oppressive of two oppressive options), but it's kind of hard for me to get mad at Sanders for not collaborating in putting lipstick on this particular totalitarian pig of law. One can maybe rationalize the USA Patriot Act in the context of it's time, it's much harder to rationalize the USA Freedom Act’s deliberate after-the-fact authorization of much of the illegal blanket surveillance that went beyond what the original Patriot Act authorized, and it's far harder to rationalize the current reauthorization of the combination, with or without minor tweaks.
- dragonwriter 6y agoI suspect it's because Bernie opposes 215 renewal with or without the amendment.
- dlp211 6y agoI doubt this. It makes no sense to not vote for the amendment irrespective of your vote for the larger bill. In other words, Sanders could vote yes on the amendment and no on the bill.
- repsilat 6y agoIt could make sense to vote against watering down the bill if you think the watered-down version is more likely to pass. This amendment could be the opposite of a poison pill (a "spoonful of sugar"?)
- loeg 6y agoThe bill will pass either way. Now it just passes with worse privacy properties for regular Americans.
- skuhn 6y agoBernie hasn't voted yet since the senate reconvened May 4th. There has been no explanation that I'm aware of for why he isn't voting. https://projects.propublica.org/represent/members/S000033/votes-missed/116 https://projects.propublica.org/represent/members/S000033/vo...
- mwfunk 6y agoThe president must be at least planning on obstructing the bill, since the only reason they'd need 60 votes would be to overcome a veto. If we treat the absences as very wimpy nay votes, and lump the 2 independents in with the party they caucus with (both Democrat), then the party breakdown looks like this: Democrats: 35 yea, 12 nay, so ~75% in favor. Republicans, 24 yea, 29 nay, so ~45% in favor. The 59 yea votes consisted of 35 Democrats (King is independent but caucuses with the Democrats), and 24 Republicans. I'm much more interested in why it failed to pass, so I'll refrain from listing the yea votes for brevity. The 4 absent senators were 2 Democrats (Sanders is independent but caucuses with the Democrats), and 2 Republicans: Alexander (R-TN) Murray (D-WA) Sanders (I-VT) Sasse (R-NE) The 37 nay votes were from 10 Democrat and 27 Republican senators: Barrasso (R-WY) Blackburn (R-TN) Blunt (R-MO) Boozman (R-AR) Burr (R-NC) Capito (R-WV) Carper (D-DE) Casey (D-PA) Collins (R-ME) Cornyn (R-TX) Cotton (R-AR) Feinstein (D-CA) Fischer (R-NE) Graham (R-SC) Hassan (D-NH) Hyde-Smith (R-MS) Inhofe (R-OK) Johnson (R-WI) Jones (D-AL) Kaine (D-VA) Lankford (R-OK) Manchin (D-WV) McConnell (R-KY) Perdue (R-GA) Portman (R-OH) Roberts (R-KS) Romney (R-UT) Rubio (R-FL) Shaheen (D-NH) Shelby (R-AL) Thune (R-SD) Tillis (R-NC) Toomey (R-PA) Warner (D-VA) Whitehouse (D-RI) Wicker (R-MS) Young (R-IN)
- ejstronge 6y agoUnless I’m mistaken, you’d need 66 votes to override a veto - the number 60 is for overriding a filibuster
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- CalChris 6y agoNo. First it has to be brought to the floor (not automatic) in each house with quorums present. It then takes 2/3s vote of members present in both houses. The minimum to override in the Senate would be 2/3 * 51 = 34 votes.
- vxNsr 6y agoWhat? the Senate has 100 members+VP, whats 51?
- bluedays 6y agoThanks Bernie!
- vmception 6y agoseems a little out of character
- ABeeSea 6y agoIt’s entirely in character. His Presidential campaigns have been extremely selfish to the point of being detrimental to his stated goals. He has very few Senate achievements given his tenure especially compared to a much shorter tenured Warren.
- dang 6y agoPlease don't take HN threads further into political flamewar. It won't do any good and will just fill the thread up with off-topic angry repetitiveness. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- dang 6y agoPlease don't do this here.
- bluedays 6y agoGO BERNIE GO BERN DA HOUSE DOWN GOOOOOOOO
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- rootusrootus 6y agoOf course! Wyden again! I'm really happy he is our senator. I wish there were more like-minded people in congress. Too bad he couldn't quite get all the necessary votes.
- davidw 6y agoMakes me pretty happy to see headlines with him and generally be quite proud of what I see. If only I could say the same thing about our congressman in OR2...
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- coronadisaster 6y ago> Of course! Wyden again! I'm really happy he is our senator. happy since 1996
- Ididntdothis 6y agoHe is 71 so maybe in 8 years the Democrats will let him run for president :-). Right now he is still a little too young.
- thephyber 6y agoPopVox record for the bill which was to be amended[1] Congress.gov article for the same bill[2] I'm thoroughly confused about the current process. It looks like HR6172 is the House "version" of the extension on the "USA FREEDOM Act" thru 2023 and S3421[3] is the Senate attempt to do the same. I can't find any references on Congress.gov which references Ron Wyden's proposed amendment. [1] https://www.popvox.com/us/federal/bills/116/hr6172 https://www.popvox.com/us/federal/bills/116/hr6172 [2] https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/6172 https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/6172 [3] https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/3421 https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/342...
- croon 6y agohttps://www.congress.gov/amendment/116th-congress/senate-amendment/1583 https://www.congress.gov/amendment/116th-congress/senate-ame...
- Rafuino 6y agoIf the Senate has amended the House bill, it will have to go back to the House (or a conference committee) to hammer out a unified version, which then needs to be voted on again and passed by both sides. This isn't a done deal (yet).
- A4ET8a8uTh0 6y agoWyden is probably one of the few senators, who is consistent on this issue. Everyone else, at best, pays lip service or repeats talking points about terrorism and the need to protect America from the ever present danger.
- rectang 6y agoOn these max-out-surveillance votes, Dianne Feinstein poorly represents the massive tech industry presence in her state.
- acdha 6y agoOr does she represent companies like Google, Facebook, or Palantir who are more concerned with pro-privacy laws cutting into their revenue? The politics of tech industry workers are not identical to their management and the latter steer a LOT more money into politics.
- icelancer 6y agoIt's more the entertainment industry in this case.
- duckMuppet 6y agoIf she were truly a poor representative of her constituents, they would've voted her out long ago. I think she represents them perfectly.
- trynewideas 6y agoIt's complicated? 538[1] (yeah, I know) did a decent dive into this back in 2018: as her electorate has moved left, she's moved right. The theories for that are pretty simple. - The Dem/GOP split swung from nearly even to 45-25 over her tenure, so there's no longer any credible Republican competition to force her back toward her original left-of-center leanings - She can outraise even the most serious Democratic challenger by more than 10-to-1 - She appeals more to pro-business, homeowner, and technocrat Democrats and independents than any other group, who in turn power that fundraising and also are responsible for Democratic plurality in the voter base So we wind up with this dichotomy of her winning every election and getting booed out of nearly every town hall. The question going forward is whether she can hang on to her seat as easily in a recession California as in a booming one, especially if her constituency shifts away from her under economic stress just as quickly as it shifted in her favor. 1: https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/california-has-left-dianne-feinsteins-moderation-behind-but-not-dianne-feinstein/ https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/california-has-left-dia...
- AmericanChopper 6y agoThis article does an incredibly bad job of explaining the current status of this law, and what is expected to happen next. Has the existing law expired? Is it being replaced with something equally bad? Is the replacement subject to further change? Am I just bad at reading?
- billme 6y agoLink to the bill & the EFF’s analysis of it is here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23173491 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23173491
- kitotik 6y agoOnce again the lack of media coverage on this is appalling. Rand Paul has introduced an amendment that goes up for vote tomorrow that would disallow this surveillance on American citizens, which of course is not expected to pass. McConnell is drafting language to prevent this from being used on “federal election candidates” which of course is expected to pass.
- mc32 6y agoWait, so it could be used to surveil state candidates Willy nilly? No warrant required?
- kitotik 6y agoAs it is right now, it would allow access to the internet search and browser history of anyone in the world, without probable cause or a warrant. But to be clear, this is just a reduction in friction of the previous process which was to just call a judge of a secret FISA court which no one is really allowed to know the details of. So this is likely just a move to reduce some red tape, and increase data ingress.
- docbrown 6y ago> the previous process which was to just call a judge of a secret FISA court which no one is really allowed to know the details of. This is simplifying the process to imply it’s nothing more than just a phone call away. I do not think any court works like that. They still have to argue their case before a judge of the court which also allows third parties to submit material in the case. Simply saying “no one” is suppose to know about these courts is portraying this process as something unconstitutional and nothing more than a secret society of government friends. If by no one you actually mean the public, then you have a point. There’s national security concerns around these type of things that you’re ignorantly ignoring. You act as if this court has no existed for over 40 years and under multiple administrations from both side of the aisles.
- 6y ago
- kitotik 6y agoI wonder how broadly they define “internet browsing and search history”. I’m assuming email is somehow included. I wonder if mobile app data falls under the umbrella.
- advisedwang 6y agoI imagine the intelligence community would try to interpret it as narrowly as possible, ie just the literal URLs you visited and terms you sent to Google.
- twicetwice 6y agoI'm assuming you're being sarcastic...
- kitotik 6y agoIs this sarcasm? Do members of the intelligence community have a history of wanting less information than they can get?
- mcny 6y ago> Do members of the intelligence community have a history of wanting less information than they can get? No, the idea is to limit the scope of what requires a warrant.
- thephyber 6y agoYour logic is inverse. The thing at question was an amendment to add additional proof for access to "internet browsing and search history" data, so if the "intelligence community" defines that term as narrowly as possible, (assuming the "USA FREEDOM Act", the bill which was to be amended, is renewed) then the potential future restriction is applied to fewer data points.
- coronadisaster 6y agoYou must be kidding? the only time they are looking only at "meta" data is when they don't have the (mental/physical) capacity to analyze the rest... look at this for example: https://www.businessinsider.com/when-can-the-government-read-your-email-2013-6 https://www.businessinsider.com/when-can-the-government-read... (they can read any emails that are older than 6 months without a warrant.... since 1986, if they are stored on a 3rd party server)
- macawfish 6y agoDoesn't it have to go back to the House anyway? Am I missing something? I thought that bills needed to pass in both the House and Senate before they can be signed into law? Now in the House they'll have an opportunity to reject the bill with McConnell's original amendment, which is obviously dispicable. This all seems like political theater, like Senator Schumer allowed a vote on this today knowing Sanders would be out. This way, the GOP looks slimy and the House has more reason to simply reject the bill as is and Bernie Sanders can be the scapegoat --> more support for Biden. If this amendment had passed, it'd have been harder for the House to reject the bill. (Sanders was out today with Ilhan Omar advocating for international debt relief for indebted countries. )
- coldcode 6y agoI read it was merely a replacement of something already in, and thus does not need to be returned to the house.
- dragonwriter 6y agoThe House has already passed the surveillance renewal bill, so unless the Senate passes the House bill with at least one amendment (so it's not technically the same bill), it doesn't have to go back to the House.
- macawfish 6y agoI've been reading that Mitch McConnell's changes, the ones that would expressly allow warrantless surveillance, are a "new amendment". Wouldn't that kind of reporting imply that this amendment hasn't yet been cleared in the house?
- vxNsr 6y agoDemocrats are federally elected officials and are of course gonna vote yes on his amendment. Just bec they wear a blue tie it doesn't suddenly make them less self serving.
- 6y ago
- billme 6y agoHere’s the bill, might want to read it before commenting: https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/6172 https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/6172 —— or better yet, read what the EFF wrote recently on it: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/04/yes-section-215-expired-now-what https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/04/yes-section-215-expire...
- 0xDEADBEF 6y agoWould a VPN basically make even a warrant useless in obtaining browsing data from your ISP?
- wheelerwj 6y agoIt depends on how well you use the VPN, and of course any who doesn't use a VPN is wildly acceptable.
- pmorici 6y agoNo, it just puts your VPN provider in the position your ISP was in assuming they both keep similar records.
- 0xDEADBEF 6y agoWell in that case, I would be OK since the VPN I use (ProtonVPN) doesn't keep any logs.
- phone8675309 6y agoThat you know of
- pmorici 6y agoSure, until they get a government order compelling them to do so. Don't confuse something that is not done by choice with something that is not done because it is not possible.
- tsukurimashou 6y agomost VPN will tell you they don't keep log, which is probably not true
- 0xDEADBEF 6y agoWhy would they? There is 0 incentive and are not legally required to from Switzerland law.
- throwlaplace 6y ago'Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds' -Robert Oppenheimer we did this to ourselves. we built these tools that are now at the disposal of people with malicious intentions. in another thread about surveillance of WFH employees everyone is aghast that managers would use such tools. again: we did this to ourselves. you can shift the blame any number of times around the loop of responsibilities it's not my fault it's my boss's fault -> it's not my fault it's the government's fault -> it's not my fault it's the constituency's fault -> it's not my fault it's the business's fault and so on. someone has to admit fault and break the loop. for my part this year i left a dod funded project even though the money was easy.
- thephyber 6y agoI don't think it's a reasonable comparison to make between WFH managers of consenting employment contracts and the national security apparatus which we didn't get to vote on or opt out of. The rationale for the Manhattan Project (the impetus for your quote by Oppenheimer) was that the US government thought that if we got the atomic bomb before our national enemies, we would be more virtuous in its usage. That is always the blind faith that US government workers, military, and contractors use to justify working on military/surveillance technology. Until all of those government workers stop deluding themselves into the "exceptionalism" fallacy, the technology used against Americans will continue to outpace our ability to protect against it or perhaps to even know about it.
- throwlaplace 6y agoi'm constantly so frustrated by the lack of imagination of people on this forum. employees of some company consented more or less just as much as we did - they consented by staying in the employ and we consented by voting/not voting/not emigrating. in fact we consented more because we at least had a say in representation. is that a silly argument? good i agree - those workers are just as aggrieved as we are in this case. >more virtuous in its usage we technologists are deluded in the exact same way. something along the lines of "our code doesn't hurt people who didn't deserve it/consent to it".
- djaque 6y agoJust a reminder that if you're upset about this, politics is an active process. I'm going to look up my senator's votes right now and send them an email if they were one of the nay votes.
- sokoloff 6y agoIt’s probably useful to send them an email even if they voted aligned with your interests. Positive reinforcement also works.
- djaque 6y agoWhelp... I'm 0/2 for my senators. Here is my letter BTW, feel free to copy it and use it to get in contact with your reps. Look up their votes here [1]. Dear Representative $NAY_VOTER, I'm writing you to express my disappointment in your recent vote on May 13 to reject Wyden amendment no. 1583. This amendment would have required law enforcement agencies to obtain a warrant before accessing American's web browsing data. Despite bipartisan support, the amendment failed to garner the required 3/5 majority by only one vote. The controversial language of section 215 of the Patriot Act provides the government with broad powers to collect information related to federal investigations. Unfortunately, that power extends to the warrant-less collection of American's private information. This even includes innocent and law-abiding citizens who's only relation to an investigation is that their records are considered "relevant" in some manner. Privacy reform is important now more than ever with the increasing role of technology in our daily lives. Please give me your support in creating meaningful oversight for our country's surveillance programs. Sincerely, Djaque [1] https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=116&session=2&vote=00089#position https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_...
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- A4ET8a8uTh0 6y ago2/2 For once, I don't have to be embarrassed about Duckworth.
- Melting_Harps 6y agoShort term solution: Well VPNs for all, Ghostery [1] was running a deal on their paid version with a VPN built into their add-on [1]. Long term: The State is making their panopticon ambitions overt now in the public eye, thus spurring on the need to re-design the Internet entirely to avoid this. Anyone know what Starlink is offering in terms of privacy? Details are sparse for the most part right now, but given their ties to DoD I'm not sure how this will play out. Sounds like a product release presentation is needed to clarify some things. Edit: I plan on buying Ghostery Midnight but it's Windows/Mac only, so no Linux! I guess these Bitcoin accepting ones will have to do [2]. 1: https://www.ghostery.com/midnight/ https://www.ghostery.com/midnight/ 2: https://www.comparitech.com/blog/vpn-privacy/vpn-bitcoin/ https://www.comparitech.com/blog/vpn-privacy/vpn-bitcoin/
- quest88 6y agoDon't use VPN services: https://gist.github.com/joepie91/5a9909939e6ce7d09e29 https://gist.github.com/joepie91/5a9909939e6ce7d09e29
- brobinson 6y agoBut, according to that link, you should be using one in this case: "You are on a known-hostile network (eg. a public airport WiFi access point, or an ISP that is known to use MITM), and you want to work around that." An internet connection from an ISP operating under a government that logs your browsing history is a "known-hostile network".
- judge2020 6y agoThis law would almost certainly be exercised via Google and not the ISP, which can't see the contents of your browsing history anyways.
- kitotik 6y agoBut most ISPs will have DNS lookup records. Most users aren’t savvy enough to set their own DNS servers. I’m not sure on the current status of DNS over HTTPS, but I’d imagine .gov could just compel cloudflare or whoever to provide logs.
- yalogin 6y agoThese hits will keep coming. The only way is to fight it by joining the system and setting up a pro-privacy lobby group and fund it. I don’t know how long it can last though. I am pessimistic about this.
- pstuart 6y agoShouldn't one's personal data be a Fourth Amendment issue?
- Reelin 6y agoYes it ought to. Unfortunately the current logic seems to be (approximately) that by voluntarily using a third party system the data is no longer your personal property. The obvious issue with this is that (for example) it seems to treat a Google Docs spreadsheet differently than one stored locally. The way the law is currently worded simply isn't sufficient (IMO) now that the internet exists.
- rayiner 6y agoA Google doc is bits encoded onto Google’s property (its servers). A local Excel spreadsheet is bits encoded onto my property (my computer). The law treats them differently because they are totally different. Yes, there is a bunch of fancy technology that makes it look and feel like the two things are the same. But why should a technological illusion trump physical reality? In reality, you can tell where the bits are and who owns the physical thing that the bits are on. The fourth amendment very neatly and cleanly delineates between the two scenarios based on who owns the relevant “papers and effects.”
- Reelin 6y agoHey I completely agree that it's how the law is currently written. Reflecting a bit more on my Google Docs example (which differs from the original browsing history topic) I believe it was faulty. It would be a bit odd to treat bits I own as not mine simply because they're stored on hardware owned by someone else. In fact on it's face it appears to go against existing precedent that the 4th amendment applies to a rented storage unit. When it comes to sensitive data like browsing history though, regardless of legal ownership it certainly feels like a form of unreasonable search. I really can't blame the original authors for failing to anticipate the existence of the internet though.
- rayiner 6y ago
- hackerbabz 6y agoWhat is the court precedent that lets congress decide whether a warrant is needed for a specific thing? It’s a thing being searched and seized...what’s the argument?
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- mnm1 6y agoToo bad. Sounds like they could have passed it if certain senators weren't taking a vacation from defending our rights. Quite disappointing really.
- kenneth 6y agoInteresting to note that one of the reasons this did not pass is Bernie Sanders' failure to support the amendment. Keep that in mind next time someone riles about how Bernie is a champion for the average American. I, for one, am glad he will never be President.
- oojojo 6y agoDemocrats rejected = More use of FISA warrants to Spy on Americans, with no oversight. Woot !
- oojojo 6y agoAwesome. Now, FISA warrants can continue to be used without oversight to spy on Americans!! Goooo team! And who wants to do this?? These guys! yaaaaay! http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2020/roll099.xml http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2020/roll099.xml
- gkoberger 6y agoAs a Bernie supporter, I'm disappointed by his lack of a YES vote. We at least deserve a statement. I'm going to suggest a potential explanation, but I'm still disappointed by the lack of vote and/or statement. Based on how Patty Murray (D) has said she would have voted YES but wasn't able to get to DC in time, it's clear it was never going to pass to begin with. This happens often – someone like Mitch McConnell might whip the votes, realize they're ahead, and allow a few Republicans that are at-risk to vote YES to provide cover for them in the future. Remember, even if you count the two Independents as Democrats, there's still 6 more Republicans. We've seen this with Susan Collins a lot; if Republicans don't need her vote she'll vote against them. But when they need it, she votes with the party like clockwork. So, now we get to be mad at Sanders and Murray (the Democrats who weren't in DC), and nobody blames the 37 Republicans who actually killed it. Remember that McConnell decides what is voted on, and he always knows the votes. Maybe the one exception ever was McCain saving Obamacare. I feel certain Sanders would have voted YES. He's historically been mostly pro-Snowden, anti-surveillance, and pro-whistleblowers (it's nuanced; for example he thinks Snowden should be prosecuted but also thinks what he did was right and that he should get a plea deal). (Not the point, but it's insane Senators have to be physically present, especially given the situation. At least one Senator missed the vote due to quarantine. Why are we making a 78 year old man physically fly to DC to vote, and do so in a chamber full of at least one person who has had COVID-19 recently?) Like I said, I'm still disappointed we haven't even gotten a statement from Sanders yet. But this whole thing has been on my mind a lot today.
- kenhwang 6y agoI agree that this likely wouldn't have passed even with Bernie since McConnell can easily whip a vote to switch. That being said, this puts Bernie's incompetence at politicking in the spotlight. Any half decent politician would've been able to deflect, Murray is a perfect example of how easy it is.
- gkoberger 6y agoI think his "incompetence at politicking" is what draws a lot of people to him (since he comes off as much more genuine and real), however it's a "live by the sword, die by the sword" situation. There have been a frustrating number of times where I felt a simple tweet could have saved a lot of bad optics.
- armenarmen 6y agoIs there a list of who voted against this?
- jadell 6y agoYes there is: https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/116-2020/s89 https://www.govtrack.us/congress/votes/116-2020/s89
- toofy 6y agoThis is just backwards. People in power should always have to justify their actions to us. Always. They should always be questioned. This (in theory) is how we ensure their power isn’t abused. We should have privacy while they do not. A lack of privacy should be a cost to the power they’re entrusted with. If it’s legal for them to sift through our lives while they refuse to be questioned, and they act insulted that we dare question their actions, we have gone off the rails.
- RonanTheGrey 6y ago"People should not be afraid of their governments; governments should be afraid of their people." 100% agree that the tradeoff of power should be a loss of privacy.
- toofy 6y agoIt’s important to stress: They should happily answer with accurate and honest data when asked. We have hit a wall where our leaders react with vitriol when asked what they’re doing; mcconnell’s pushing for an exemption for those in power, pushing for them to have privacy while actively voting laws into place which drastically reduce ours should concern every single one of us–at least as much as Snowden’s docs revealed to us.
- vharuck 6y agoHow senators voted: https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=116&session=2&vote=00089 https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_...
- null0pointer 6y agoVPN + DNS-over-HTTPS (DoH) is a very potent combo turning your internet connection into an opaque pipe, as far as your ISP is concerned. DoH hides your DNS requests from your ISP, and a VPN service (basically glorified proxies these days) hide the IPs of site you're visiting. If you are concerned about this issue then I urge you to use that combo. The more people doing that and the more normal that kind of traffic becomes the less able law enforcement is to use it as probable cause or similar. AFAIK Mullvad is a non-US VPN service that does not require personal info for sign up and accepts cryptocurrency payments. Though I haven't used them myself so I can't speak for service quality. For DoH, I'm only aware of Google and Cloudflare offering that. However they are both US companies so if anyone has a non-US recommendation I would appreciate it. At least using them is one step removed from your ISP, making it a little harder to get your records. Please correct me if I have anything wrong.
- badrabbit 6y agoLots of things change but the fact that rulers need to subdue the ruled has not changed. What has changed is how either civilians or the military could withdraw their consent which gives a government legitimacy. Society thought it would be a good idea to log our thoughts and lives on computers and the internet,now rulers can monitor the ruled and adopt before they can organize any effort to withdraw their consent. Suddenly all the weapons,money and elections are futile against rulers that monitor and manipulate thoughts and social relationships. You can imagine why they feel like americans must be spied on. Their ability to maintain rule depends on it. Not all citizens are created equals in their minds. Deep divisions and addiction to power. Begining of the end, or end of the begining?
- Descartes1 6y agoAnd if you use an offshore VPN?
- DrScump 6y agoThis is a really sloppy article. "But the amendment fell short by one vote of the required 60 votes to pass the chamber." No, it needed 60 for cloture, to stop debate. Pass/fail requires a simple majority in a subsequent vote. "Assuming none of the amendments pass, the final bill is likely to skip the House — which passed its version of the bill earlier this year — and await the president’s (sic) signature." Uh, that's not how it works. A bill isn't enrolled (sent to the President) until the identical contents pass both houses. So, if the House has a distinct version with any difference whatsoever, it can't proceed.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- bryanrasmussen 6y agonormally narrowly rejects is a construction used to indicate something bad was going to be done, so narrowly rejecting it is still bad, which I mean I guess this was still bad but not because the rejection was narrow.
- tsukurimashou 6y agoorbital VPNs that don't have to comply to a specific country laws when
- d0ne 6y agoCommitting the initial capital to form a FEC recognized national political party The Privacy Party to begin direct opposition to this and related activities. If you are interested in collaborating or learning more: https://theprivacyparty.org/ https://theprivacyparty.org/
- kag0 6y ago> I can understand why a system built on a pattern must try to destroy the free mind, for this is one thing which can by inspection destroy such a system. Surely I can understand this, and I hate it and I will fight against it to preserve the one thing that separates us from the uncreative beasts. If the glory can be killed, we are lost. ~ John Steinbeck