Domestic and International Drone Secrecy

As EFF reported last week, the FAA finally released the names of the government agencies which have applied for and received authorization to fly drones in the US. Previously, the FAA had kept this information secret, and the agency only released it in response to EFF’s lawsuit under the Freedom of Information Act.

Unfortunately, the list did not include what types of drones were authorized to fly in U.S. airspace, what they were being used for, and what type of information they were collecting. The list may be incomplete as well. The FAA has promised to release more information soon, and EFF will publish that information as soon as it becomes available.

Meanwhile, concerning the secrecy surrounding the CIA’s drone program, ACLU’s Jameel Jaffer and Nathan Freed Wessler wrote an op-ed for the New York Times last week explaining how the CIA was abusing a doctrine in FOIA known as the “Glomar Response” which allows the government, in some situations, to refuse to confirm or deny a document or program exists. In the ACLU’s FOIA lawsuit over the CIA’s drone program, the government has, so far, refused to acknowledge that the program exists.

Of course, the drone program is highly publicized and has been acknowledged by many US officials outside of court. The administration’s arguments were further undercut this week when counterterrorism chief John Brennan formally acknowledged the drone program and gave the most detailed on-the-record description to date by an administration official. Brennan said that, “President Obama has instructed us to be more open with the American people about these efforts.” Let’s hope those instructions apply to the ACLU’s lawsuit, too.

The Justice Department has repeatedly asked for more time to respond to the lawsuit, despite the judge writing a few weeks ago, “If government officials can give speeches about this matter without creating security problems, any involved agencies can.”

Report on FISA

The Department of Justice posted its annual report to Congress on FISA surveillance and other national security activities conducted in 2011. Continuing its trend of more surveillance more often, DOJ applications to conduct electronic surveillance increased to 1,676 in 2011, up from 1,579 in 2010. Continuing a similar trend, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court did not deny a single application to conduct surveillance, although the Court partially modified 30 orders.

As EPIC put it: more

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/05/week-transparency-drones-secr...