Volume: 15 Issue: 3
(March 2018)

Keywords:
national security surveillance terrorism transparency

Authors:
alex berengaut jadzia butler

Organisations:
covington & burling llp

Jurisdictions:
usa

USA: The reauthorisation of Section 702 of FISA

In 2008, Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (‘FISA’) Amendments Act established a surveillance programme aimed at collecting foreign intelligence information from non-US persons located abroad. Having been renewed once in 2012 during the Obama Administration, the programme was scheduled to sunset on 31 December 2017 absent congressional reauthorisation. Several reforms were proposed during the reauthorisation process, but most were ultimately not adopted. In this article, Alex Berengaut and Jadzia Butler, Partner and Associate respectively at Covington & Burling LLP, break down what changed (and, perhaps more interestingly, what didn’t) for the Section 702 programme, which will be in place for at least the next six years.