Analysis The FBI's latest PR salvo, as it fights to preserve its warrantless snooping powers on Americans via FISA Section 702, is more big talk of cyberattacks by the Chinese government.
Wray cited an example he's used previously about how, last year, Section 702 of America's Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act allowed the FBI to observe Chinese government snoops trying to break into an unnamed US transportation hub and take action.
Section 702 is a contentious amendment to FISA that is supposed to allow US intelligence agencies to spy on foreign intelligence targets located overseas.
In reality, the private communications of some US persons may be warrantlessly swept up in these Section 702 dragnets and analyzed by agents, which alarms privacy campaigners.
Lawmakers have the option of tweaking the rules so that warrants are required in certain circumstances or some other protections are put in place.
The Feds aren't a fan of some of the changes to 702 right now under consideration, as they argue things like warrant requirements for all those queries they run each month will slow down and hamper investigations.
Later on the call, when asked if Section 702 was used in the FBI's operation to remotely kill Volt Typhoon's KV botnet, Kaiser said she couldn't get into specifics.
We don't know all of the details, and don't have a seat in the war room where the FBI and other US agencies fight nation-state snoops on the regular.
We do know, specific to the Volt Typhoon takedown: The FBI obtained warrants that allowed it to remotely search US-based routers that had been infected with backdoor malware by China.
The Feds draw the line at having to get a warrant for each and every query they run that may involve a US citizen, resident, or organization, it seems.
Within the FISA Section 702 debate, the FBI is fighting to retain its powers to conduct, without a warrant, surveillance that may accidentally or otherwise vacuum up US persons' data - powers that have been abused millions of times by the FBI. The Feds last year said auditors determined FBI agents had achieved a 96 percent compliance rate for FISA queries.
Drilling deeper, FISA Section 702 allows the FBI and its fellow federal organizations to monitor foreigners' electronic communications beyond America's borders.
It's a wide net, and this has led to extreme cases of misuse - especially from the FBI, which has used 702 powers to conduct warrantless surveillance on US citizens including protesters, political campaign donors, and elected officials including a US senator.
In terms of cyber value, we've seen little evidence of queries providing value.
Because of these abuses, and, you know, the constitutionally guaranteed right to privacy and protection from unreasonable searches and seizures, there's been a big push to reform Section 702 and require all US intelligence agencies to obtain a warrant before conducting a US person query.
Currently, there are four bills in Congress to reauthorize Section 702.
Only two of them, the Protect Liberty and End Warrantless Surveillance Act and the even broader-reaching Government Surveillance Reform Act of 2023, include a warrant requirement.
Still, arguing the Feds can't fight terrorism and other serious crimes perpetrated by foreign governments without warrantless searches of Americans seems like a shell game at best, especially in light of the FBI's Volt Typhoon disruption, which involved court-issued search warrants.
One week it's needed to combat fentanyl, the next it's international polluters, or cyberthreats from China.
This, he said, sounds an awful lot like Uncle Sam's strategy to convince the public of the need to renew Section 702.
This Cyber News was published on go.theregister.com. Publication date: Fri, 09 Feb 2024 00:43:05 +0000