Politicians Amend Controversial CISPA Security Bill

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To address these fears, Reps. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.) and Dutch Ruppersberger (D-Md.), the bill's sponsors, set about amending the legislation and this week presented a version of CISPA which they say is much friendlier towards the rights of the internet-browsing individual. According to reports, the amended bill restricts the government's ability to collect data to situations which involve stopping "cybersecurity, investigating and prosecuting cyber crime, protecting individuals from death or serious bodily harm, protecting minors from child pornography, and ensuring national security."

Uhh... Escapists, I've been a huge anti-SOPA and PIPA person on these boards, and generally am very unhappy with how these bills are being made and passed. But I searched through the bill, read majority of it and understood most of it, and also keyword searched through it.

There really isn't anything to fear. There was no mention of finding people for death or serious bodily harm, protecting against child porngraphy, nothing like that. Seriously, try and use the Find button on the bill and no such terms as "death, serious, bodily, harm, child, minor, pornography, porn" etc come up. Ever.

I think people really need to calm down and quit with the media fear. We blame Fox News of attacking everything with fear, but we ourselves seem to do it too when we post up claiming everything is SOPA equivalents.

Read the bill yourselves: http://rules.house.gov/media/file/PDF_112_2/LegislativeText/CPRT-112-HPRT-RU00-HR3523.pdf

It even says in Page 10 Section A (line 23 on that page for you folks) that if it the Government screws up in any way with this law, it'll pay all your fees, reimburse you, and give you $1,000 for the error and then void any charges against you because of it.

Lets all take a step back from the rage and maybe understand why it's passed so well now when previous bills didn't, and with support of companies that previously didn't support such bills... maybe because it's actually a good version?

Come on, now. (Prepares flameshield for those who won't read the bill and claim I'm some Fed in disguise)

TLDR: Bring me the sections that support these claims it's another SOPA, tell me the page, section, and line, and I'll agree then if you're correct.

Here you go. https://www.cdt.org/files/pdfs/cybersec_chart.pdf

Compares the bills. Page 3 is specifically my concern, that the people who gather this information are free to use it in any way they want, including selling it, with full protection for any abuses they commit "in good faith".

Given how broad the language is, just exactly how much power is being handed to corporate management? As I see it, under this bill, a single manager who doesn't like the cut of your jib can not only use your information to find an excuse to fire you, they can BLACKBALL you through information sharing with other companies. And they're completely immunized from legal action as long as they can show the slightest justification that they're acting "in good faith".

Trust me, you do NOT want to hand some people the kind of continent-sized ass-shield represented by the phrase "in good faith". Consider what Bobby Kotik or John Riccitiello would do with such information. /shudder