Surveillance News Update: A Conference And a Lawsuit

Cato Surveillance Week 2024 kicks off on October 7. At 1pm ET each day for four straight days, I'll moderate discussions with experts in law, technology, government oversight, and journalism on the threats posed to our constitutional rights by government surveillance and the political repression it enables. Also, late Friday we filed yet another FOIA lawsuit against the FBI over FISA Section 702 violation records.

Publisher's note: This abbreviated version of The Sentinel is running a day early and takes the place of the normal Monday publishing schedule.

Cato Surveillance Week 2024

A month out from what will be perhaps the most important election since 1860, getting out-of-control federal government surveillance and the political repression it can and often does enable into the national political discussion is, from my admittedly biased perspective, critically important. To that end, I encourage you to register for Cato Surveillance Week 2024.

Starting Monday, October 7 and running through Thursday, October 10, each of those days at 1pm Eastern I'll host live, online discussions with some of the leading experts in the country on the history, law, and real-world effects on citizens of federal government surveillance practices and policies. Electronic surveillance, facial recognition, artificial intelligence, state and local law enforcement trends and practices, key federal legal decisions affecting First and Fourth Amendment rights, and threats to journalism and a free press are all on the agenda. I hope you can join live but if not, fear not--all panels will be recorded & available on Cato's website afterwards.

Suing The FBI Over Surveillance Records. Again.

Earlier this year and well before the scheduled April 19, 2024, expiration of the FISA Section 702 program, Cato filed suit in federal court to try to shake loose internal DoJ audits of the program so they could be made public before any Congressional vote to reauthorize the program. As I wrote just a few weeks ago, DoJ made sure that didn't happen. 

And as I noted in the Orange County Register piece I wrote in September 2024, when we finally did get those internal audits, they showed not only additional Section 702 database query violations, but the FBI and DoJ have literally attempted to RECLASSIFY Section 702 violation incidents previously made public by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) and the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board. That's a violation of a standing executive order, and if I had my way it would be a federal felony.

Accordingly, this past Friday, we filed yet another FOIA lawsuit against the FBI seeking Section 702 "noncompliance" (i.e., violations) correspondence from June 8, 2023, to mid-August 2024. The cast of players we've targeted with this suit includes not only FBI but other entities with whom FBI might have shared such correspondence--including Congressional oversight committees and the FISC. It's highly unlikely that this will be the last FOIA suit filed over this issue, and I'll have more to say on that as developments warrant.

Thanks for reading the Sentinel. If you're not currently a subscriber, please consider becoming one as doing so is free through 2024 and it's an easy way to show your support for my work. Also, please share this piece with family, friends, and anyone else you believe would benefit from reading it.