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Massachusetts
Senate Bill No. 931
There
is currently a bill in the Massachusetts Senate concerning the Commonwealth’s
Fusion Center and other intelligence data centers. The bill was filed on January 13, 2009 and is Bill No. 931. It would create “an office of data
protection and privacy oversight for intelligence data centers operating in
Massachusetts, including commonwealth fusion center, which shall be independent
of any supervision or control by any executive agency.” A commissioner will head this office
and serve for a three year term.
He or she can get testimony of witnesses, get access to “documents,
papers, books, records, reports, reviews, recommendations, correspondence, data
and other information” to conduct oversight and report the result of
inquiries. He or she would have
subpoena power to get witnesses or necessary documents.
The
duty of the commissioner will be to examine “on a system-wide basis, the entire
scope of the intelligence and other operations of intelligence data centers in
Massachusetts.” It will be his or
her job to “investigate, evaluate, and analyze the particular procedures, both
as written and in practice, employed by intelligence data centers to ensure
that the activities of such centers do not infringe on the rights to freedom of
assembly, association, and expression guaranteed by the United States
constitution and the Massachusetts Declaration of Rights.” The Commissioner will “investigate, evaluate,
and analyze the impact of any military involvement in intelligence data center
activities,” as well as private sector involvement. The Commissioner will “investigate, evaluate, and analyze
the quality, timeliness, completeness, accuracy and efficiency of intelligence
data centers’ responses to individuals’ requests under the provisions of
chapter 66A of the general laws.”
He or she will issue semi-annual reports, convene and participate in
public hearings, “provide independent oversight of data and privacy protection
functions at intelligence data centers.”
He or she will advise the public and public officials “about the data
and privacy protection operations” of the state’s fusion and intelligence
centers.
In
Section 2 of the bill it prohibits state and local law enforcement agencies,
prosecutorial offices, police or peace officers from collecting and maintain
information “about the political, religious or social views, associations or
activities of any individual, group, association, organization, corporation,
business or partnership” unless it relates directly to an investigation of
criminal activities or “there are reasonable grounds to suspect the subject of
the information is involved in criminal conduct.”
Section
3 of the law guarantees such things as “All protected information shall be
evaluated for the reliability of its source and the accuracy of its content
prior to being recorded in any investigation file.” A review process will be conducted every 5 years.
The
ACLU of Massachusetts maintains Senate Bill 931 is the way to provide oversight
“for government data collection and surveillance operations in
Massachusetts.” The “cornerstones
of our democracy and liberty are now under assault by a wave of new
surveillance technologies that have dramatically expanded the ability of the government
to secretly monitor and collect data on virtually every aspect of our daily
lives.” The question is will the
legislature in Massachusetts pass this bill and thus set up a mechanism for
oversight of fusion centers? Will
other states follow in the footsteps of Massachusetts? Or will the intelligence infrastructure
set up to protect our liberty -
undermine it for lack of oversight?
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