The LEADS Act and cloud computing

[Commentary] Bipartisan legislation, introduced in February in the House and Senate, promises to reform and update the antiquated Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) and in the process push back against the practice by agencies of government to gain access to personal data stored on US corporation servers abroad. The legislation, called the LEADS Act, is co-sponsored in the Senate by Sens. Orrin Hatch (R-UT), Chris Coons (D-DE) and Dean Heller (R-NV), and in the House by Reps. Tom Marino (R-PA) and Suzan DelBene (D-WA).

Short for "Law Enforcement Access to Data Stored Abroad," the LEADS Act's principal improvements on ECPA are in recognizing that US law enforcement may not use warrants to compel the disclosure of customer content stored outside the United States unless the account holder is a US person, and by strengthening the process -- called MLATs (mutual legal assistance treaties) -- through which governments of one country allow the government of another to obtain evidence in criminal proceedings. The bipartisan LEADS Act provides a path forward to update the law to permit the cloud to be more meaningful and useful to media companies -- and to others concerned about the privacy and security of their data. And by doing so, Congress can bolster the competitiveness of an emerging and important area of our information economy.

[Patrick Maines is president of the Media Institute]