ALAWON: American Library Association Washington Office Newsline Volume 14, Number 84 August 26, 2005 In This Issue: (1) FBI uses administrative subpoena to get library records (2) ALA releases full report on law enforcement activity in libraries (1) FBI Used PATRIOT Act's administrative subpoena to get library records in Connecticut Yesterday the ACLU revealed that the FBI has used Section 505 of the USA PATRIOT Act to obtain electronic library records at an institution in Connecticut whose identity cannot be disclosed because of constraints imposed by the PATRIOT Act. This is the further evidence that the FBI is indeed using provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act to obtain library patron reading records, an activity the American Library Association (ALA) has fought since the passage of the legislation in 2001. ALA has argued that Section 505 of the USA PATRIOT Act gives the FBI overly broad authority to use a National Security Letter (NSL), an administrative subpoena which requires no judicial oversight, to secretly obtain the electronic library records of any person – whether or not that person is suspected of a crime - without any standard for protecting individual privacy. Records searched could include all the websites visited and all the e-mail sent and received by anyone who used the library's computers. Such open-ended fishing expeditions expose all library users to the search and seizure of their records and to the invasion of their privacy. A gag order accompanies the NSL that prevents its recipient from disclosing that a demand for records has been received. "The Connecticut case illustrates exactly why ALA continues to fight sections of the PATRIOT Act that allow the government to secretly search the records of ordinary citizens without any judicial oversight," said ALA Immediate Past President Carol Brey- Casiano. "Despite the Justice Department's repeated assertions that it has no interest in Americans' reading records, this case again proves that the government is demanding patron information from America's libraries" she continued. In 2004, a federal district court judge held that NSLs gave the FBI unchecked authority to obtain records from electronic communications service providers, including libraries, "without any judicial oversight or opportunity for challenge." In striking down the provision, the judge found that the secret administrative subpoenas violated the fourth amendment because they "effectively bar or substantially deter any judicial challenge to the NSL." It further found that even if judicial review were provided, the gag order violated the First Amendment because it represented "a prior restraint on speech that was sweeping in scope" and appeared to apply "in perpetuity." Two bills reauthorizing the USA PATRIOT Act have passed in the House and Senate and will go to conference next month. The Senate bill, S. 1389 (the USA PATRIOT Improvement and Reauthorization Act of 2005), adds many of the safeguards for privacy of reading records that have been sought by ALA since the passage of the law, including tougher requirements for searching library records under Section 215 and an opportunity to challenge an NSL as violating a Constitutional or legal right and to challenge the gag order. The House Bill (H.R. 3199 – The USA PATRIOT and Terrorism Prevention Reauthorization Act of 2005) does not include improved reader privacy protections. ALA is encouraging Conferees to vote for the Senate bill. (2) ALA releases full report on law enforcement activity in libraries The ALA today released the full report of its survey measuring law enforcement activity in America's libraries. Preliminary findings, released in June, revealed that at least 137 legally executed requests by federal and state/local law enforcement in both academic and public libraries have taken place since October, 2001 - 63 legally executed requests for records in public libraries and 74 such requests in academic libraries. The full report of survey findings includes contextual data including responses to interviews and an appendix containing the survey instrument. Researchers developed a representative sample of more than 1,500 public libraries, of which 33 percent responded to the survey. Of the 4,008 academic libraries invited to participate in the survey, 23 percent responded. The project was funded with support from the John L. and James S. Knight Foundation, the Carnegie Corporation of New York and the Ford Foundation. The study report can be found online at: http://www.ala.org/oitp. ****** ALAWON (ISSN 1069-7799) is a free, irregular publication of the American Library Association Washington Office. All materials subject to copyright by the American Library Association may be reprinted or redistributed for noncommercial purposes with appropriate credits. To subscribe to ALAWON, send the message: subscribe ala-wo [your_firstname] [your_lastname] to listproc@ala.org or go to http://www.ala.org/washoff/alawon. To unsubscribe to ALAWON, send the message: unsubscribe ala-wo to listproc@ala.org. ALAWON archives at http://www.ala.org/washoff/alawon. ALA Washington Office, 1301 Pennsylvania Ave., N.W., Suite 403, Washington, D.C. 20004-1701; phone: 202.628.8410 or 800.941.8478 toll-free; fax: 202.628.8419; Web site: http://www.ala.org/washoff. Executive Director: Emily Sheketoff. Office of Government Relations: Lynne Bradley, Director; Don Essex, Joshua Farrelman, Erin Haggerty, Patrice McDermott and Miriam Nisbet. Office for Information Technology Policy: Rick Weingarten, Director; Carrie Lowe, Kathy Mitchell, Carrie Russell. ALAWON Editor: Bernadette Murphy.