We Must Stop CISA

Update: September 2015

Several amendments have been submitted to CISA since we first reported on the bill. As EFF outlines, most of these amendments don’t address the core issues and do not adequately create the link between “cybersecurity” as purported by the government and surveillance. While a few of the amendments are positive, many of them are not favorable and it’s imperative that we continue to push back against CISA. You can view the proposed amendments to CISA here and continue the fight.

Original Post: We Must Stop CISA

CISA, the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act, will be voted on soon by the US Senate. While the bill is being purported on the platform of cybersecurity, it is in fact a surveillance bill.  If passed, it would greatly expand the power of governments and corporations to spy on people by accessing their user data and communications.

The CISA bill would grant companies the right to monitor their users’ data, including emails, passwords and IP addresses. Further, the bill encourages companies to share “cyber threat indicators” with the government – and to do so liberally – in return for some protections from the surveillance laws.

CISA would give companies like Facebook and Google nearly unrestricted access to personal data, and encourage them to share more with the government. What’s worse, all of this would occur without the knowledge of the user, who has virtually no control over where their data may wind up.

Golden Frog is adamantly opposed to this bill. Neither companies nor the government should have this sweeping, unprecedented access to user data. This is a gross invasion of the right to privacy, and a dangerous direction for the information technology industry as a whole.

We are not the only ones who feel this way. The organization Fight For the Future has created the #FaxBigBrother campaign, which uses the hashtag to send millions of faxes to US senators in protest of this bill. Other organizations are also speaking out strongly against the bill and working to combat it, including the Electronic Frontier foundation, the ACLU, and the Sunlight Foundation.

It’s important we band together to Stop Cyber Surveillance and stop CISA. 

Here’s what you can do to help:

• Send a fax in protest of the bill
• Email your representatives from the EFF Action Page
• Use the hashtag #StopCISA on social media