Today, Congressman Jerrold Nadler (D-NY), the Ranking Member of the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property and the Internet, renewed his call to enact major legislative updates to our nation’s privacy laws in light of the White House’s recently released “Big Data” privacy report.
“The White House’s report calling for an update to the laws impacting electronic communications and privacy is a good first step, but more needs to be done. With communications technology evolving at an exponential rate, we must revise our privacy laws in a corresponding manner,” said Rep. Nadler. “The Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) was passed in 1986, well before we commonly used the Internet for e-mail or the countless other functions that the Internet and technology play in our daily lives. In an era of increased government surveillance and the ability of the NSA to seemingly access almost anything on the internet, Congress must act to update the law to reflect our new ideas of what it means for ‘the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures.’”
As Chair of the Constitution and Civil Justice Subcommittee of the House Judiciary Committee from 2007-2010, Congressman Nadler held multiple hearings on ECPA reform. During the 112th Congress, Congressman Nadler and Congressman John Conyers, Jr. (D-MI), the Ranking Member of the House Judiciary Committee, introduced the Electronic Communications Privacy Act Modernization Act of 2012, which would have required law enforcement to obtain a warrant based on probably cause before searching email. That approach, now embodied in the Yoder-Polis “Email Privacy Act,” has the support of 207 House co-sponsors.
“Our nation’s laws must be brought up to date with the advances in technology and to clarify issues of electronic privacy. We must now redouble our efforts to achieve reform and in doing so ensure that our laws strike the right balance between the interests and needs of law enforcement and the privacy interests of the American people,” said Rep. Nadler.