A key opponent of the Senate’s threat-sharing cybersecurity bill offered an amendment to ban mandatory surveillance “back doors” in U.S. devices.
Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), the sole member of the Intelligence Committee to vote against the bill in markup, said over the weekend that his amendment failed on a 3-12 vote.
{mosads}“Any information-sharing legislation that lacks adequate privacy protections is not simply a cybersecurity bill, but a surveillance bill by another name,” Wyden commented on the Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act (CISA).
“I am also disappointed that my amendment to prohibit government agencies from requiring U.S. hardware and software companies to build weaknesses into their products was not adopted,” he said.
“I have introduced this amendment as stand-alone legislation and will continue to pursue this goal.”
The debate over surveillance back doors is a crucial flashpoint in ongoing conversations about how to balance privacy with the investigative needs of law enforcement.
Building technologies with access points known only to police agencies would provide a guaranteed way into users’ data.
The Obama administration has come out in favor of this approach in some form, while privacy advocates see it as a dangerous move that would be easily exploitable by cyber criminals.
Wyden’s revelation that he sought to ban back doors during the CISA markup underscores the controversy surrounding the idea. The issue is likely to come up this summer in the debate over reauthorizing key National Security Agency surveillance programs.