Cybersecurity Act 2013: CISPA VS NSA Phone Records Collection Fight Heads To Congress

The Cybersecurity Act of 2013, or CISPA, is butting heads with the NSA phone records collection scandal in Congress.

As previously reported by The Inquisitr, back in 2012 President Obama was considering enacting the Cybersecurity Act of 2013 via an executive order despite the Senate shooting CISPA down.

That didn’t happen but the CISPA Cybersecurity Act of 2013 did pass the House of Representatives earlier this year. The current version of the Cybersecurity Act aims to increase the sharing of information between the government and privately owned companies like Google, Yahoo, Apple, and Microsoft. But everything changed with the revelations of Edward Snowden and the NSA scandal. Still, the CISPA Cybersecurity Act is continuing to be debated up on Capitol Hill.

Then the revelations about NSA phone records collection joined the battle. It’s now thought to be possible that the NSA actively sought to archive all cell tower site data in order to pinpoint the location of Americans via their cell phones. The NSA is also accused of blindly recording and saving all phone conversations.

NSA Director Keith Alexander (who is famous for his Star Trek NSA command room) was asked whether the aim of NSA spying was to collect the records of all Americans. In response, Alexander said, “I believe it is in the nation’s best interest to put all the phone records into a lockbox – yes.”

In response to these revelations Senate announced a bill to end all NSA phone records collection activities. This amendment to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act would also allow “Americans affected by the eavesdropping [to] sue for damages in U.S. courts and allow companies to disclose more information about cooperation with government surveillance.”

But while talking to Congress recently NSA Director Keith Alexander indirectly defended the CISPA Cybersecurity Act of 2013 by referring to the recent Kenyan hostage crisis, saying:

If you take those [surveillance powers] away, think about the last week and what will happen in the future. If you think it’s bad now, wait until you get some of those things that happened in Nairobi.”

What do you think about the CISPA Cybersecurity Act of 2013 and allegations of a NSA phone records collection?