Senate proposes strong privacy, civil liberties protections in USA Freedom Act

On Tuesday, Microsoft Executive Vice President and General Counsel Brad Smith released a statement praising the Senate’s efforts to enact stronger privacy and civil liberties protections in government surveillance reform legislation:

I would like to thank Senators Leahy, Lee, Heller and Franken for their efforts to bring meaningful reform to government surveillance. By establishing a panel of advocates to argue before the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court and requiring it to issue statements about its decisions, the Senate bill strengthens our privacy rights and civil liberties.

We’re also pleased that the bill bans the bulk collection of data and allows companies to be more transparent about requests we receive from the government.

For more on what government surveillance reforms Microsoft has advocated, see Unfinished business on government surveillance reform.

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