Privacy advocates split over NSA reform bill

A coalition including civil liberties groups and government whistleblowers has come out against a Senate bill responding to the government surveillance and data collection revealed by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden. Many observers see the current Senate version of the USA Freedom Act as the most likely to succeed. But a letter released by the group argues that the language in the bill is too murky and could actually codify some controversial government programs while failing to provide meaningful prohibition against mass surveillance.

"The USA Freedom Act has significant potential to degrade, rather than improve, the surveillance status quo," the letter warns. "At best, even if faithfully implemented, the current bill will erect limited barriers to Section 215, only one of the various legal justifications for surveillance, create additional loopholes, and provide a statutory framework for some of the most problematic surveillance policies, all while reauthorizing the Patriot Act." Signers of the letter include NSA whistleblowers William Binney and Thomas Drake, as well as journalist Daniel Ellsberg, who revealed the Pentagon Papers, and groups including Progressive Change Campaign Committee, the Sunlight Foundation, Restore The Fourth, and Fight for the Future.

But notably absent from the list are some of the big-name civil liberties groups -- including the American Civil Liberties Union, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the Center for Democracy & Technology and New America Foundation's Open Technology Institute -- who have signed on to a letter endorsing the version of the bill introduced by Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy (D-VT).