Intelligence & Surveillance
Just Security’s expert authors provide legal and policy analysis of intelligence and surveillance activities, focusing on their impact on national security and on civil liberties and privacy rights, and their oversight by Congress and the courts.
1,846 Articles
On Human Rights Day, One Year On: No Apology and No Accountability for US Torture
A year ago yesterday, the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence released a redacted version of the executive summary of its exhaustive report on the CIA’s detention and interrogation…
European Human Rights Court Deals a Heavy Blow to the Lawfulness of Bulk Surveillance
In a seminal decision updating and consolidating its previous jurisprudence on surveillance, the Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights took a sideways swing at mass…
Cy Vance’s Proposal to Backdoor Encrypted Devices Is Riddled With Vulnerabilities
Less than a week after the attacks in Paris — while the public and policymakers were still reeling, and the investigation had barely gotten off the ground — Cy Vance, Manhattan’s…
Cross-Border Data Requests: A Response to Greg Nojeim
Editor’s note: This post also appears on Lawfare. Last week on Lawfare, Greg Nojeim responded to — and raised a set of questions about — our proposed framework for dealing…
Bulk Collection Under Section 215 Has Ended… What’s Next?
This post is the latest installment of our “Monday Reflections” feature, in which a different Just Security editor examines the big stories from the previous week or looks…
The President’s NDAA signing statement re: GTMO and anti-torture provisions
The President today signed into law into law S. 1356, the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2016. The good news is that Section 1045 of the NDAA in effect codifies…
Remember Why We Have the Fourth Amendment
The Paris attacks have fueled a debate over surveillance on both sides of the Atlantic that, while not new, has reached a level of hysteria that I have not witnessed since the…
The UK Draft Investigatory Powers Bill (aka, the Revised “Snooper’s Charter”)
Earlier this month the Draft Investigatory Powers Bill, the UK Government’s attempt to legitimize State surveillance powers, was presented to Parliament. Depending on your perspective,…
Power Wars Symposium: A Study in Contrasting Views of Executive Authority
Editor’s Note: This is the latest entry in a symposium Just Security is hosting in conjunction with the recent release of Power Wars: Inside Obama’s Post-9/11 Presidency by…
The Government Should Stop Rewarding Bad Policies for Police Body Cameras
Body cameras have major potential to increase police accountability. However, without informed policies governing their use, they might not only fail in this goal, they could actually…
Still Secret: Second Circuit Keeps More Drone Memos From the Public
Secret law has been anathema to our democracy since its Founding, but a federal appeals court just gave us more of it. Almost two centuries ago, James Madison wrote that “[a]…
Cross-Border Data Requests: A Proposed Framework
Editor’s note: This post also appears on Lawfare. We’ve both written and spoken extensively (for example, here, here, here, here, and here) about issues related to cross-border…