At a House Judiciary Committee hearing prior to the Congressional recess, Rep. Andy Biggs (R-AZ) spoke about abuses of FISA by the FBI.
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00:00I now recognize the gentleman from Alabama, Mr. Moore, to lead us in the Pledge of Allegiance.
00:27I now recognize myself for an opening statement.
00:30I welcome my colleagues to this important hearing, and I welcome our witnesses and thank
00:35them for being here today.
00:37The Fourth Amendment guarantees all Americans the right to be free of unreasonable government
00:41searches and seizures.
00:43With advances in technology, Americans' personal data has become easily tracked and collected,
00:48and the government can and does obtain this information without acquiring a warrant and
00:52without ever notifying an individual who is subject to a search.
00:57This is especially prevalent in the context of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
01:02Reports in recent years detail how the FBI, under the leadership of past FBI directors, abused
01:07its authorities under FISA.
01:09The FBI used its authorities under Section 702 of FISA to conduct millions of queries of
01:14U.S. person communications.
01:15At its peak, the FBI conducted nearly 3 million such searches in 2021.
01:22In recent years, those numbers have begun to decline, but the FBI still conducts thousands
01:27of U.S. person queries every month.
01:31These actions violate the privacy and civil liberties of Americans and likely infringe on their Fourth
01:36Amendment protections.
01:38I have called for serious reforms to FISA for years.
01:41And last Congress, we undertook the task of attempting to rein in years of FISA abuses.
01:47Congress enacted a bill that included various reforms, such as new and heightened criminal
01:50and civil penalties for those who violate FISA.
01:53We significantly reduced the number of FBI personnel authorized to approve queries.
02:00We required audits of U.S. person queries and implemented many new reporting and transparency
02:04measures.
02:05But we must still work to protect the Fourth Amendment rights of all Americans.
02:10I introduced an amendment to require a warrant for all U.S. person queries.
02:14This amendment included various exceptions to allow the FBI and the intelligence community
02:18to do its vital work of defending our homeland while protecting Americans' privacy rights.
02:24This amendment had broad bipartisan support, and we worked closely with our colleagues across
02:28the aisle in an attempt to address this issue.
02:31I believe such a reform is necessary to end the abuses of Americans' rights, but reforming
02:36FISA itself is not enough.
02:39The government has plenty of other tools at its disposal to collect information on Americans.
02:43Currently, the laws governing how the Fourth Amendment is applied in the digital context
02:49is the Wild West.
02:51Key legislation in this space is the Electronics Communications Privacy Act, which was written
02:55in 1986 and did not take into account all the advances in digital communications that have
03:01occurred since.
03:03The iPhone, for example, did not show up for two decades after this law was written.
03:08These cell phones have become such an integral part of our lives that, as the Supreme Court
03:12has held, they now, quote, hold for many Americans the privacies of life, close quote.
03:18Federal agencies are able to sidestep the requirements of the Fourth Amendment and access and collect
03:23massive amounts of private information on Americans by exploiting a legal loophole in
03:27this act.
03:29Rather than obtain a warrant, government agencies like the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the
03:33Internal Revenue Service, the Drug Enforcement Agency, and the Department of Homeland Security
03:38can simply turn to data brokers and purchase mass amounts of Americans' data.
03:43This includes such private information like location and health information and so on.
03:48Currently, with a disturbing amount of frequency, data brokers sell Americans' personal information
03:53to law enforcement and intelligence agencies without any court oversight, in contrast to strict
04:00rules that prevent phone companies and social media sites from selling such information to
04:04the government.
04:06We also are aware of reports of the federal government using facial recognition technology.
04:11This is a powerful tool that can be used to help solve crimes, but this technology also
04:15raises serious issues concerning First and Fourth Amendment rights.
04:19Law enforcement agencies could potentially use this technology to surveil individuals who
04:24are not engaged in any illegal activity whatsoever.
04:28For example, we have seen reports of ATF using facial recognition to find gun owners.
04:33The federal government has also returned to private companies like Clearview AI to purchase
04:37access to facial recognition technology.
04:40Clearview AI pulls publicly available photographs from social media sites and puts them into a
04:45database marketed to law enforcement.
04:47Clearview AI's founders called the service a search engine for faces.
04:52The Government Accountability Office has conducted studies of federal law enforcement entities' use
04:56of this technology in recent years.
04:58It found that federal law enforcement agencies had not properly assessed privacy and other
05:03risks associated with the use of this technology.
05:07And some did not even know which systems their agents were using.
05:11As technology continues to develop, the government has more and more information about Americans
05:15available to it.
05:16Used improperly, this will continue the pattern of government surveillance of U.S. citizens that
05:20we have fought so hard against.
05:23Congress must protect the privacy rights of Americans and uphold the guarantees of the Fourth Amendment.
05:27I look forward to this opportunity to discuss the dangers of mass surveillance and explore
05:32meaningful reforms.
05:33I appreciate our witnesses and the members for being here today and the public for attending
05:37as well.
05:38I now recognize the ranking member of the entire committee, Mr. Raskin, for his opening statement.
05:45Thank you very much, Chairman Biggs, and thanks to our distinguished witnesses for joining us
05:51here today.
05:52The Fourth Amendment guarantees the right of the people to be secure in their persons.
05:55The Fourth Amendment—
06:05Say that, when you are in a person, you call looked at the people to be secure, and find
06:09them in their presence.
06:11The Every Day of the country must be secure.
06:13The timbre of Israel reveals aolinic Wyoming, and the oppressed THEY have made decisions of the
06:13fact that their own country must build up in its day as a servant of Allah, instead.