Facebook, the social network behemoth that is about to become a multi-billion dollar company, has been lobbying for a proposed new U.S. law called the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA) that would allow companies to share information with government agencies. Zaid Jilani at the Republic Report has been digging up details on the Washington lobbyists who are helping Facebook.<\/p>\n
\u201cUnder CISPA, private companies may spy on user communications<\/a>, whether stored or in transit, and freely pass personal information to the government as long as they claim a vague “cybersecurity” exception,\u201d write Mark M. Jaycox and Lee Tien at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. \u201cThe bill also creates expansive legal immunity that makes companies and the government largely unaccountable to users. Companies \u2018acting in good faith\u2019 are also excused from all liability for engaging in potential countermeasures, even if they hurt innocent parties.\u201d<\/p>\n This is not the first time that the U.S. Congress has tried to pass a dubious law on computer security in the name of stopping piracy. Last year, the Stop Online Piracy Act and the Protect IP Act \u2013 backed by Hollywood and opposed by Facebook, Google and Wikipedia \u2013 was defeated after a huge backlash<\/a>. Opponents noted that the law \u2013 as drafted – would threaten freedom of speech and support Internet censorship.<\/p>\n Mike Rogers, a Republican from Michigan, and Dutch Ruppersberger, a Democrat from Maryland, are the sponsors of the new bill. Unusually for Washington, the two men work together well, according to the Washington Post<\/a>.\u00a0 Rogers is a former Federal Bureau of Investigations agent who has been promoting the drone war, notes the Post, and the two men have the backing of people like Michael Hayden, former director of the Central Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency. So it is small wonder that CISPA will help out the intelligence agencies by expanding their powers of surveillance.<\/p>\n Not surprisingly, activists like Avaaz are campaigning against CISPA<\/a> and so is (surprisingly) the Obama White House, which has threatened to veto the bill if it makes it to the president\u2019s desk<\/a>.<\/p>\n But Facebook \u2013 which opposed the cyber-security bills last year \u2013 has decided to support CISPA. The proposed law \u201cwould make it easier for Facebook and other companies to receive critical threat data from the U.S. government,\u201d Facebook\u2019s Washington DC office posted on its blog<\/a>.\u00a0 It would \u201cimpose no new obligations on us to share data with anyone \u2013- and ensures that if we do share data about specific cyber threats, we are able to continue to safeguard our users\u2019 private information, just as we do today.\u201d<\/p>\n Well, many Facebook users would testify that the company actually does a very poor job of protecting user\u2019s private information.<\/a><\/p>\n