White House takes aim at CISPA with formal veto threat [View all]

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Source: CNET

The White House today escalated its opposition to a cybersecurity-related surveillance bill with a formal veto threat.

In a new statement, the White House's Office of Management and Budget said that the CISPA bill endangered Americans' privacy and inappropriately shielded private companies from liability.

The statement suggests that CISPA -- also known as the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act -- goes too far by giving the National Security Agency too much power:

H.R. 3523 effectively treats domestic cybersecurity as an intelligence activity and thus, significantly departs from longstanding efforts to treat the Internet and cyberspace as civilian spheres. The Administration believes that a civilian agency -- the Department of Homeland Security -- must have a central role in domestic cybersecurity, including for conducting and overseeing the exchange of cybersecurity information with the private sector and with sector-specific Federal agencies.

The American people expect their Government to enhance security without undermining their privacy and civil liberties. Without clear legal protections and independent oversight, information sharing legislation will undermine the public's trust in the Government as well as in the Internet by undermining fundamental privacy, confidentiality, civil liberties, and consumer protections. The Administration's draft legislation, submitted last May, provided for information sharing with clear privacy protections and strong oversight by the independent Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board.

Read more: http://news.cnet.com/8301-31921_3-57421267-281/white-house-takes-aim-at-cispa-with-formal-veto-threat/

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(Note to mods: Last 2 paragraphs are excerpted from a white house press release thus are public domain material.)

full white house statement: http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/omb/legislative/sap/112/saphr3523r_20120425.pdf