[Infowarrior] - Privacy Board Clears U.S. Spy Programs

[Richard Forno]

Mar 5, 9:13 PM EST

Privacy Board Clears U.S. Spy Programs

By HOPE YEN
Associated Press Writer
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/T/TERROR_PRIVACY?SITE=WIRE&SECTION=HOME
&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT

WASHINGTON (AP) -- A White House privacy board is giving its stamp of
approval to two of the Bush administration's controversial surveillance
programs - electronic eavesdropping and financial tracking - and says they
do not violate citizens' civil liberties.

Democrats newly in charge of Congress quickly criticized the findings, which
they said were questionable given some of the board members' close ties with
the Bush administration.

"Their current findings and any additional conclusions they reach will be
taken with a grain of salt until they become fully independent," said Rep.
Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., who chairs the House Homeland Security Committee.

After operating mostly in secret for a year, the five-member Privacy and
Civil Liberties Board is preparing to release its first report to Congress
next week.

The report finds that both the National Security Agency's warrantless
eavesdropping program and the Treasury Department's monitoring of
international banking transactions have sufficient privacy protections,
three board members told The Associated Press in telephone interviews.

Both programs have multiple layers of review before sensitive information is
accessed, they said.

"We looked at the program, we visited NSA and met with the top people all
the way down to those doing the hands-on work," said Carol Dinkins, a
Houston lawyer and former Reagan administration assistant attorney general
who chairs the board.

"The program is structured and implemented in a way that is properly
protective and attentive to civil liberties," she said.

Some board members were troubled by the Homeland Security Department's
error-ridden no-fly lists, which critics say use subjective or inconclusive
data to flag suspect travelers.

One area the board will focus on in its report is the computerized
anti-terrorism screening system recently announced by DHS and used for years
without travelers' knowledge to assign risk assessments to millions of
Americans who fly abroad.

"That's a place where there's a lot of opportunity for improvement," Dinkins
said.

Lanny Davis, a former Clinton White House counsel and the lone Democrat on
the panel, described the board's first report to Congress as modest. He said
most of the work in the past year was spent being briefed on the
administration's surveillance programs.

"We felt reassured regarding the checks-and-balance concerns," Davis said.
He said that after several classified briefings, members were impressed by
the multiple layers of review, which included audit trails to track whoever
has access to the data.

Still, Davis said he anticipated the board will continue to monitor the
program as needed. "It would be a mistake if that was the end of the
review," he said.

The board's initial findings come as Congress is moving forward on measures
to give the board more authority and make it more independent of the
president. Created in late 2004, the panel was established as a compromise
between Congress and the White House after a recommendation by the Sept. 11
commission.

Both conservative and liberal civil liberties groups have urged the members
to aggressively review the eavesdropping program and have questioned whether
board members would stand up to the president if he were flouting the law.

In recent weeks, the administration has agreed to let a secret but
independent panel of judges oversee the program. But many lawmakers and
civil libertarians have remained skeptical about its legality, and the
Justice Department's inspector general is investigating whether the agency
used any of the information improperly.

The warrantless program monitors phone calls and e-mails between the United
States and other countries that are suspected to be linked to agents of
al-Qaida. A federal judge in Detroit last August declared the program
unconstitutional. Government attorneys have since asked a Cincinnati-based
appeals court to dismiss the lawsuit, arguing the case is moot because the
surveillance is now monitored by a secret court.

Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information
Center, called it absurd that the White House board effectively gave the
eavesdropping program its stamp of approval even before the administration
was forced to backtrack and submit it to court oversight.

"I have no confidence in the current board in its ability to provide
meaningful evaluation of important programs such as the no-fly lists, based
on its work on the domestic surveillance program," he said. "It is critical
that Congress make the civil liberties board independent of the executive
branch."

The board does not have subpoena power, and the White House can change its
annual reports before they go to Congress. The members serve at the pleasure
of Bush, and Attorney General Alberto Gonzales has final say over whether
officials must comply with the board's recommendations.

Separate House and Senate measures would require that the entire board - not
just the chairman and vice chairman - be confirmed by the Senate.

The House version would also remove the board from the executive office of
the president but keep it within the executive branch and give it subpoena
power. The Senate version would keep the board within the executive office
and allow it to ask the attorney general to issue subpoenas, with notice to
Congress required if a subpoena request was refused or modified.

The privacy board members declined to comment on the proposed legislation.
But they have made it clear they believe the board works effectively in its
current structure and that it could alienate the president if members took
on a more openly adversarial role.

Bush appointed Dinkins, a Republican, to chair the board. A longtime friend
of the Bush family, she was treasurer of Bush's first campaign for governor
of Texas, and she is a longtime partner in the law firm of Vinson & Elkins,
where Gonzales was once a partner.

The panel's other GOP members are vice chairman Alan Raul, a Washington
attorney, and former U.S. Solicitor General Theodore Olson. Former
Ambassador Francis Taylor is an independent.

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On the Net:

Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/privacyboard/

© 2007 The Associated Press.