ALERT: Digital Telephony Public Hearings, DC, 2/17/94, 9:30am EST

[Stanton McCandlish <mech@eff.org>]

For immediate release - distribute widely, but quickly

02/18/94 - Congressional Hearings on FBI Digital Telephony proposal, Wash. DC


WHERE & WHEN:

On March 18, 1994 (TOMORROW), a joint Senate-House public hearing will be
held on the FBI's Digital Telephony proposal.  The hearing will be held
at 10:30am EST (but staffers suggest you arrive one hour early to be
assured of a seat), at room 226 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building,
near Constitution & 1st Streets, NW (next door to the Hart Building).  
The hearing should last approximately 2 hours.

Witnesses will include FBI Director Louis Freeh, Electronic Frontier
Foundation Executive Director Jerry Berman, US Telephone Assoc. Pres. Roy
Neel, and Plymouth Co. Mass. DA William O'Malley (also Pres. Nat'l.
District Attorney Assoc.)  The hearing was arranged by the Senate Judiciary
Committee's Subcommittee on Technology and the Law, and the House Judiciary
Committee's Civil and Constitutional Rights Subcommittee.  The hearings
will be chaired by Sen. Patrick Leahy, who also intends to hold hearings on
the Administration's Clipper Chip scheme, and Rep. Don Edwards.


WHAT YOU CAN DO

Written comments may be submitted, before or after the hearing, to:

Subcommittee on Technology and the Law
Attn: Beryl Howell
Senate Judiciary
815 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington DC 20510 USA

Note that such comments do not become part of the official record of the
hearing, but are probably still important.  Let your representatives in
government know what YOU have to say.  According to Senate Judiciary staff,
such comments will be received, reviewed and considered before, during and
after the hearings.

Comments can also be faxed to the Senate Judiciary office:

Beryl Howell, Technology and the Law Subcommittee
+1 202 224 9516 (fax)

More information is available from the Senate Judiciary office staff:
+1 202 224 3406 (voice)


BACKGROUND: 

The Clinton Administration is backing a proposal by law enforcement
agencies that could make the entire communications infrastructure
susceptible to surveillance.  The Digital Telephony Proposal, reintroduced
this year after being successfully thwarted last year, would require
communications service providers to include "back doors" in their software
through which "wiretapping" can be done.  In addition, the proposal would
give law enforcement officers access to records *about* communications,
such as who you call, how long you talk, what online services you
frequent, who you send email to and where: if it's something you do
online, it is to be laid bare for inspection. Such traffic analysis can
reveal vast amounts of information about you, and the potential privacy
invasion is far more revealing than past techniques of traffic analysis. 
EFF is extremely concerned about this proposal and has prepared a
detailed summary to explain it and the harm it could do.  See:
ftp://ftp.eff.org/pub/EFF/Policy/Digital_Telephony/digtel94_analysis.eff
ftp://ftp.eff.org/pub/EFF/Policy/Digital_Telephony/digtel94.announce

EFF has received a draft of the FBI's new, proposed "Digital Telephony"
bill.  After initial analysis, we strongly condemn the bill, which would
require all common carriers to construct their networks to deliver to law
enforcement agencies, in real-time, both the contents of all communications
on their networks and the "signalling" or transactional information.

In short, the bill lays the groundwork for turning the National Information
Infrastructure into a nation-wide surveillance system, to be used by law
enforcement with few technical or legal safeguards.  This image is not
hyperbole, but a real assessment of the power of the technology and
inadequacy of current legal and technical privacy protections for users of
communications networks.

Although the FBI suggests that the bill is primarily designed to maintain
status quo wiretap capability in the face of technological changes, in
fact, it seeks vast new surveillance and monitoring tools.
Among the new powers given to law enforcement are:

*  Real-time access to transactional information creates the ability to
   monitor individuals "live".
*  Access to communication and signalling information for any mobile
   communication, regardless of location allows tracking of an individual's
   movements.
*  Expanded access to electronic communications services, such as the
   Internet, online information services, and BBSs.
*  The power to shut down non-compliant networks

Several documents, including the full text of the proposed bill and a more
detailed section-by-section analysis are available via anonymous ftp on
EFF's ftp site, as well as an archived copy of this announcement, and
FBI Director Louis Freeh's Digital Telephony speech from late 1993.

The documents can be located via ftp, gopher, or WWW, as follows:

ftp://ftp.eff.org/pub/EFF/Policy/Digital_Telephony/digtel94_bill.draft
ftp://ftp.eff.org/pub/EFF/Policy/Digital_Telephony/digtel94_analysis.eff
ftp://ftp.eff.org/pub/EFF/Policy/Digital_Telephony/digtel94.announce
ftp://ftp.eff.org/pub/EFF/Policy/Digital_Telephony/digtel93_freeh.speech

gopher: substitute "gopher://gopher.eff.org/00/" for "ftp://ftp.eff.org/pub/"
WWW: substitute "http://www.eff.org/" for "ftp://ftp.eff.org/"


THE ELECTRONIC FRONTIER FOUNDATION

1001 G Street NW, Suite 950 E
Washington DC 20001 USA
+1 202 347 5400 (voice)
+1 202 393 5509 (fax)
+1 202 638 6120 (BBS)
Internet queries: ask@eff.org
General info: info@eff.org

-- 
Stanton McCandlish * mech@eff.org * Electronic Frontier Found. OnlineActivist
"In a Time/CNN poll of 1,000 Americans conducted last week by Yankelovich
Partners, two-thirds said it was more important to protect the privacy of
phone calls than to preserve the ability of police to conduct wiretaps.
When informed about the Clipper Chip, 80% said they opposed it."
- Philip Elmer-Dewitt, "Who Should Keep the Keys", TIME, Mar. 4 1994


-- 
Stanton McCandlish * mech@eff.org * Electronic Frontier Found. OnlineActivist
"In a Time/CNN poll of 1,000 Americans conducted last week by Yankelovich
Partners, two-thirds said it was more important to protect the privacy of
phone calls than to preserve the ability of police to conduct wiretaps.
When informed about the Clipper Chip, 80% said they opposed it."
- Philip Elmer-Dewitt, "Who Should Keep the Keys", TIME, Mar. 14 1994