Today, the ACLU sent a letter to both the House and Senate, urging them to provide secure voice and text messaging capabilities to Members and their staff. (The Washington Post about our letter today.)
In recent years, computer security researchers have warned about the poor security of cellular networks, which in many cases use broken encryption technology that is several decades old. As a result, it is often trivially easy for third parties—which can include foreign intelligence services, criminals and stalkers—to intercept calls and text messages.
Although the calling and texting services provided by wireless carriers are not secure, there are a number of widely available secure communications apps that individuals and organizations can use to protect themselves. These include tools like Apple’s iMessage and Facetime, Facebook’s WhatsApp, and Open Whisper Systems’ Signal.
In the letter we sent today, to the House and Senate Sergeants at Arms—who are also responsible for Congress’ digital security—we encourage the Sergeants to provide smartphones and secure communications apps, such as Signal or FaceTime, to members and their staff. As we note in the letter:
While the civil liberties implications of vulnerable government information technology may not be readily apparent, they are nonetheless, and increasingly, significant….secure communications facilities preserve effective checks and balances in constitutional government, and insecure facilities threaten them. Those checks and balances serve as safeguards of individual liberties and civil rights. They also protect the civil liberties and privacy of the thousands of Congressional and government employees, who are themselves attractive targets of both foreign adversaries and, indeed, insider threats.
Ensuring the security of Congressional communications against all interception—whether by foreign governments, criminals, or even other branches of the U.S. government or rogue Congressional staffers — would promote both basic liberty interests and national security.
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Press ReleaseDec 2024
Privacy & Technology
ACLU Applauds Arizona Supreme Court Historic Decision That Police Need a Warrant to Access DNAACLU Applauds Arizona Supreme Court Historic Decision That Police Need a Warrant to Access DNA
PHOENIX — In a 7-0 decision, the Arizona Supreme Court ruled that a warrant is required to extract and analyze people’s DNA, saying that a person’s limited consent to a search of biological material for a specific purpose—in this case, a blood alcohol test for a DUI arrest—does not overcome that requirement. The ACLU and the ACLU of Arizona filed a friend-of-the-court brief in State v. Mitcham, arguing the government cannot genetically test biological material it already has in its possession—whether that’s blood taken from newborns to test for diseases or swabs collected from sexual assault survivors—to investigate the donors for a crime without first obtaining a warrant. In the decision, the court wrote that “in reaching this conclusion, we emphatically reject the State’s position that it was free to analyze Mitcham’s blood in any way it pleased simply because the State lawfully possessed the blood vials.” “Government analysis of our DNA can expose detailed information about our identity, appearance, family relationships, medical conditions, and more. We don’t consent to sharing all of that information each time we involuntarily shed our DNA or consent to a blood draw. The government’s argument in this case was a privacy nightmare,” said Vera Eidelman, staff attorney with the ACLU’s Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project. “We are greatly heartened by the Arizona Supreme Court’s decision to preserve the privacy of our sensitive genetic information.” In 2015, during a DUI arrest, the defendant in this case consented to the government collecting a sample of his blood solely to test it for blood-alcohol content, and was advised that the sample would be destroyed after 90 days. Instead, law enforcement held on to this sample for three years, at which point it used it for a completely different purpose—to extract and analyze his DNA, without a warrant or consent—while investigating another crime. Had the court accepted the government’s rationale here, all of us who consent to a biological sample collection, at any point in time, for any purpose, to any government entity, could have been subject to a warrantless DNA search after the fact. “Our DNA can reveal so much about us that our genetic privacy must be protected,” said Jared Keenan, legal director of ACLU of Arizona. “The Court’s decision is vital to protecting the strong constitutional rights that keep all Arizonans’ information safe from warrantless searches and unconstitutional intrusion.” -
News & CommentaryDec 2024
Privacy & Technology
Face Recognition Threatens to Replace Tickets, ID at Sports Events – and BeyondFace Recognition Threatens to Replace Tickets, ID at Sports Events – and Beyond
You shouldn't participate in face recognition ticketing schemes. -
MississippiJul 2024
Free Speech
Privacy & Technology
NetChoice v. FitchNetChoice v. Fitch
Whether a law that mandates age verification for all users of social media services violates the First Amendment. -
News & CommentaryDec 2024
Privacy & Technology
AI Generated Police Reports Raise Concerns Around Transparency, BiasAI Generated Police Reports Raise Concerns Around Transparency, Bias
AI-generated police reports threaten to exacerbate existing problems in law enforcement, and to create new ones.