Protecting Citizens, and Their Privacy

[Commentary] Our major conclusion is that the nation needs a package of reforms that will allow the intelligence community to continue to protect Americans, as well as our friends and allies, while at the same time affirming enduring values, involving both privacy and liberty, that have made the United States a beacon of freedom to so much of the world. We made 46 recommendations to the president.

We offer here a summary of 10 of our most significant conclusions, in the hope of explaining our reasoning to the American people and encouraging a public discussion of these vital issues.

1. The government should end its domestic program for storing bulk telephone metadata.
2. Americans deserve strong safeguards against intrusions into their personal domain.
3. We need more transparency in the system.
4. When Americans engage in communications with non-Americans, Americans should be assured that their government will respect their privacy
5. Steps should be taken to protect the privacy, and to respect the dignity, of non-Americans
6. To protect our nation’s security, surveillance against non-American citizens in foreign nations, including foreign leaders, may be justified, but to ensure that such surveillance is justified and not inconsistent with other national priorities, the president should create a new process, requiring high-level policy approval of all sensitive intelligence requirements and the methods that the intelligence community may use to meet them.
7. Our legal system is based on the fundamental premise of the adversarial presentation of competing views.
8. Congress should create a strengthened and independent Civil Liberties and Privacy Protection Board with authority to review government activity relating to foreign intelligence generally, and not only for counterterrorism, whenever that activity has implications for civil liberties and privacy.
9. Substantial steps must be taken to safeguard Internet freedom.
10. Significant reforms must be adopted to reduce the risks associated with “insider threats,” which can threaten privacy and national security alike.