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Codebreaker

White House knocks CISPA

John Moe Apr 18, 2012


Oh, CISPA. Things were going so well for you. We told you yesterday on the show about how the bill to allow sharing of information between the government and big companies was coming under fire from privacy advocates who feared that the bill would give companies a bit too much freedom to report people to the government. Then we told you in the memo yesterday about how the bill was being hastily rephrased to omit language about copyright protection in advance of a possible House vote next week. NOW, it looks like the White House isn’t too crazy about CISPA either, according to new reports.  
The Hill quotes a new statement coming from the National Security Council spokesperson Caitlyn Hayden:

“The nation’s critical infrastructure cyber vulnerabilities will not be addressed by information sharing alone,” Hayden said.

“Also, while information sharing legislation is an essential component of comprehensive legislation to address critical infrastructure risks, information sharing provisions must include robust safeguards to preserve the privacy and civil liberties of our citizens. Legislation without new authorities to address our nation’s critical infrastructure vulnerabilities, or legislation that would sacrifice the privacy of our citizens in the name of security, will not meet our nation’s urgent needs,” she said, without explicitly mentioning CISPA.

Of course, the House is Republican and may pass the bill anyway but it doesn’t look like it’s moving up the chain into law without some more pretty drastic rewrites.

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