On December 18, 2015, the President signed into law bill H.R. 2029, the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2016, the so called end-of-year omnibus spending package.
The law was criticized by the ACLU (American Civil Liberties Union) (see here), which claims that Congress added some parts of the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act (Cisa). According to the ACLU, this surveillance bill would do nothing to stop cyberbreaches but it would make “it easier for the NSA and FBI to get your private information”. It would mean that:
- companies can now share your private information with the government, preempting all other privacy laws;
- companies will face no liability for sharing your personal information with DHS;
- any information shared also goes to the NSA and FBI;
- private information shared can be used to prosecute you for crimes that have nothing to do with cybersecurity.
For more information, Francesca Giannoni-Crystal
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