leaks. This and other examples of the FISC’s attempt at blending ex parte and adversarial court powers in secret was the root cause of the unnerving personal surveillance programs of the NSA. Ultimately, as Dragu argues, “reducing privacy does not necessarily increase security from terrorism” (75). Additionally, as the ECJ held in the Data Retention Case, “the feeling of surveillance generated by vast metadata collection is inimical to privacy and democracy, and individuals ought to be protected” from such surveillance (Fabbrini 91). Furthermore, as explained by Hina Shamsi and Alex Abdo, director and staff attorney on the ACLU’s National Security Project, transparency by the NSA and FISC and accountability on the part of the executive are necessary so that they stay within the limits of U.S. law (9). Moreover, the only digital privacy law protecting Americans, the Electronic Citizens’ Protection Act, was written in 1986 and is severely outdated. Also, the Supreme Court should recognize that individuals retain their privacy claim when they share information with electronic service providers, and should recognize that the question of personal data ownership is irrelevant because “the retention in itself…constitutes an infringement on the right to privacy” (Fabbrini 92-93). These changes would bring the privacy policies of the U.S. closer to those of the EU, and would help to solve internet privacy problems that arise when companies initiate different privacy protections for different countries. Also, executives and surveillance agencies should not be responsible for making such legislation because they always “have incentives to push for decreased privacy protections,” and are therefore biased (Dragu 75). The best way to implement such changes would be to introduce what Orin Kerr, the Fred C. Stevenson Research Professor at George Washington University Law School, calls a ‘rule of lenity.’ This rule is adapted from criminal law, and states that “[w]hen courts interpret [surveillance] laws, ambiguity should be construed in favor of the citizen and against the state”
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