mike rogers

CISPA plan to let feds receive confidential data wins big House vote

The U.S. House of Representatives has overwhelmingly approved a controversial data-sharing bill that would authorize e-mail and Internet providers to share confidential information with the federal government.

By a 288-127 vote today, the House adopted the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act, better known as CISPA, which supporters say is necessary to protect American networks from electronic attacks and intrusions. The vote signals more support for the bill than it enjoyed last year, when it cleared the House by a narrower margin but died in the Senate. (See CNET's CISPA FAQ.)

CISPA is "so important to our … Read more

CISPA vote means companies can't promise to protect privacy

Google, Facebook, Twitter, and other Internet companies and e-mail providers will be prohibited from making legally binding promises to protect your privacy, thanks to a vote this afternoon in the U.S. House of Representatives.

By a 5-8 vote, the House Rules committee rejected a bipartisan fix to the CISPA data-sharing bill that would have ensured companies' privacy promises -- including their terms of use and privacy policies -- remained valid and legally enforceable in the future.

The vote came after Rep. Pete Sessions, a Texas Republican who's the committee's influential chairman, urged his colleagues to vote against … Read more

Obama threatens veto of CISPA database-sharing bill

The White House today delivered a formal veto threat against a controversial data-sharing bill called CISPA that would allow intelligence agencies to collect personal information about Americans from private companies.

In a statement this afternoon, President Obama's aides said they "would recommend that he veto the bill," which is scheduled for a House of Representatives floor vote this week.

A House committee approved CISPA last week without four key privacy amendments. Sought by CISPA opponents, the amendments would have curbed the National Security Agency's ability to collect confidential data. (See CNET's CISPA FAQ.)

The White … Read more

Privacy backlash against CISPA cybersecurity bill gains traction

It's not exactly a secret where President Obama stands on a controversial Republican-backed cybersecurity bill: he's already promised to veto it.

But a cadre of Internet activists opposed to the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act nevertheless created a petition to the president asking him to "stop CISPA" -- and it has crossed the 100,000-signature threshold necessary to secure a response from the administration.

In reality, there's little Obama can do to stop CISPA that he hasn't already done. The administration offered a stark warning in last year's veto threat, which talked … Read more

House approves CISPA despite last-minute push by opponents

The U.S. House of Representatives today approved a controversial Internet surveillance bill, rejecting increasingly vocal arguments from critics that it would do more to endanger Americans' privacy than aid cybersecurity.

By a vote of 248 to 168, a bipartisan majority approved the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act, or CISPA, which would permit Internet companies to hand over confidential customer records and communications to the National Security Agency and other portions of the U.S. government.

CISPA would "waive every single privacy law ever enacted in the name of cybersecurity," said Rep. Jared Polis, a Colorado Democrat, … Read more

Homeland Security Internet monitoring dropped from CISPA

Rep. Mike Rogers, the author of a controversial Internet surveillance bill and chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, isn't exactly a card-carrying civil libertarian.

The Michigan Republican has called for the execution of accused Wikileaker Bradley Manning. His CISPA bill, which passed the House of Representatives this afternoon, has been savaged as obliterating "any semblance of online privacy" for Americans and, by fellow Republilican Ron Paul, as "Big Brother writ large."

But Rogers strode onto the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives this afternoon to invoke the same Big Brother epithet to denounce … Read more