Steve Lendman blog February 21 2013
It’s more about destroying personal freedom than online security. It gives government and corporate supporters unlimited power to access personal/privileged information online.
Civil liberty protections are ignored. Security experts, academics, and other professionals expressed outrage. They called CISPA and John McCain’s SECURE IT Act measures that “allow entities who participate in relaying or receiving Internet traffic to freely monitor and redistribute those network communications” unjustifiably.
They encourage transferring private communications to government agencies. Accountability and transparency are lacking. Vague language describes network security attacks, threat indicators, and countermeasures.
Innocuous online activities can be called cybersecurity threats. Eroded privacy laws will be gutted. Web sites visited, personal emails, and other online contact may be freely accessed.
Obama’s State of the Union address stressed no-holds-barred cyberwar. Earlier he declared waging it globally.
In May 2009, he prioritized cybersecurity. He called cyber-threats “one of the most serious economic and national security challenges we face as a nation.”
“America’s economic prosperity in the 21st century will depend on cybersecurity,” he claimed.
He ordered a top-to-bottom assessment. A Cyberspace Policy Review followed. He supports draconian cybersecurity bills. Passage threatens constitutional freedoms.
His February 12 Executive Order (EO) called for “Improving Critical Infrastructure Cybersecurity.”
Threats continue to grow, it said. National security challenges must be met.
“It is the policy of the United States to enhance the security and resilience of the Nation’s critical infrastructure and to maintain a cyber environment that encourages efficiency, innovation, and economic prosperity while promoting safety, security, business confidentiality, privacy, and civil liberties.”
“We can achieve these goals through a partnership with the owners and operators of critical infrastructure to improve cybersecurity information sharing and collaboratively develop and implement risk-based standards.”
Natural News ~ It is likely no coincidence that on the verge of President Obama’s plan to sign an unconstitutional Executive Order (EO) implementing police state cyber security measures, the internet gets hit with one of the worst DDoS attacks ever perpetrated. Today, GoDaddy got “nuked” with a highly-coordinated DDoS attack, taking down its name servers, websites, hosted email and all its internal phone systems. (
Just because SOPA and PIPA, the infamous internet “kill switch” bills, are largely dead does not mean the threat to internet free speech has become any less serious. The Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA), also known as H.R. 3523, is the latest mutation of these internet censorship and spying bills to hit the U.S. Congress — and unless the American people speak up now to stop it, CISPA could lead to far worse repercussions for online free speech than SOPA or PIPA ever would have.