By April 30, Congress must decide whether and how to reauthorize Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). Even though the legislation is theoretically about allowing U.S. intelligence agencies to spy on foreigners outside the U.S., in practice, it can be and is used to spy on Americans inside the U.S. without a warrant. Accompanied by the administration’s embrace of AI surveillance technologies, reauthorizing FISA without significant reforms is extremely dangerous.
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What is Section 702? And what reforms would better protect Americans’ privacy? Click through this ACLU explainer and read the sections that interest you. Then, share it with your people along with the call script in the 10-minute workout.
The Section 702 fight doesn’t break down cleanly along party lines. Reauthorizing it as-is and reforming it are both positions with bipartisan support. So, it’s important to call your members of Congress whether they’re Democrats or Republicans. Make the call today (this is time sensitive) using this sample script from QuitGPT.
(Pairing Section 702 with AI makes it significantly easier to surveil Americans’ communications 24/7, which is why QuitGPT is encouraging those of us participating in its ChatGPT boycott to take a stand.)
Want to go further in convincing others to take a stand against Section 702? QuitGPT gives instructions for making a short video to post on social media. (This one from the ACLU is also great for inspiration.) Additionally, consider going outside and chalking pro-privacy messages where you live, perhaps outside the offices of any Congressional representatives near you.
Is the current administration tracking Americans in a database? Listen to “If You Can Keep It: Privacy Protections Under the Trump Administration,” an episode of the WAMU and NPR podcast 1A.
And I think there’s a real irony here, which is that not only are we losing our privacy, all of this stuff, all of these contracts are being paid for by taxpayer money, so we’re being forced to fund it at the same time.
