Senate leaders are sounding the alarm over the possibility that a critical intelligence community surveillance tool could lapse temporarily on Friday.
of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which authorizes the government to spy on foreigners abroad, is set to expire on Friday, and top lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are urging their colleagues not to engage in a battle over amending the House bill., praised the law as a critical tool in identifying terrorism threats and emphasized any kind of lapse in the program could become a major national security problem.
“If you have access to any communications, the government can force you to help it spy,” Sen. Ron Wyden said Tuesday. “That means anybody with access to a server, a wire, a cable box, a Wi-Fi router, a phone, or computer. This can all happen without any oversight whatsoever.” “In the event of a statutory lapse, some providers, American companies that are working with us, are likely to stop a reduced cooperation, perhaps with existing targets of collection, but especially with new ones,” Warner said. “We know this can happen — because it’s exactly what happened when a similar lapse occurred following the lapse of Section 702’s predecessor statute, the Protect America Act.
The Senate is expected to take its first vote on the bill Thursday evening and will be required to make a deal on debate and amendments to avoid the lapse of the program’s authority.
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