In news from Capitol Hill, Wired.com reports executives from Verizon and AT&T have started pouring political contributions into the coffers of Democratic Senator Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia. Rockefeller chairs the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. Last week he voted to support giving the telecoms retroactive immunity from lawsuits over the companies role in the Bush administration's secret, warrantless surveillance programs that targeted Americans. In March, top Verizon executives, including CEO Ivan Seidenberg and President Dennis Strigl, wrote personal checks to Rockefeller totaling $23,500. AT&T executives have also donated more than $19,000 to Rockefellar since April. Prior to this spring, donations from Verizon and AT&T executives to Rockefeller were almost non existent. Both Verizon and AT&T are being sued for allegedly turning over billions of calling records to the government.
 
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) filed suit against the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) last week, demanding any information about telecommunications companies' efforts to get off the hook for their role in the government's illegal electronic surveillance of millions of ordinary Americans.
 
Congress is currently considering granting amnesty to the telecoms -- a blatant attempt to derail lawsuits aimed at holding the companies responsible for knowingly violating federal privacy laws with warrantless wiretapping and the illegal transfer of vast amounts of personal data to the government. EFF represents the plaintiffs in Hepting v. AT&T, one of dozens of class-action suits accusing the telecoms of violating customers' rights by illegally assisting the National Security Agency with this domestic surveillance.
 
News reports have described an elaborate lobbying campaign by the telecoms to drum up support for legislation that would hold them unaccountable for their actions, and Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell has publicly voiced his support for amnesty. But McConnell's office has not yet responded to EFF's Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests to disclose records about this lobbying activity.
 
"Congress is debating amnesty for the telecoms right now -- amnesty that could imperil judicial review of a very controversial government program, as well as threaten class-action lawsuits that impact millions of Americans," said EFF Staff Attorney Marcia Hofmann. "We deserve to know what kind of lobbying has gone on behind the scenes before lawmakers make this critical decision."
 
EFF's suit asks for the immediate disclosure of ODNI's telecom lobbying records, including any documents concerning briefings, discussions, or other contacts officials have had with representatives of telecommunications companies or members of Congress. This lawsuit comes just two weeks after EFF filed a similar FOIA suit against the Department of Justice for withholding records on telecom lobbying.
 
Lawsuit Filed as Congress Debates Letting Industry Off the Hook for Illegal Spying
 
The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) told a congressional committee last week that the government's illegal dragnet electronic surveillance opens the door to even more privacy violations for ordinary Americans.
 
The sheer volume of personal information collected and the databases in which that information is stored create a giant target for attackers who want to steal or expose Americans' personal data. In a response to questions asked of EFF by the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, EFF Legal Director Cindy Cohn explained in comments submitted Friday that an increase in the number of databases introduces more points of vulnerability into the system, putting sensitive personal information from millions of people at risk.
 
"We have all heard about security problems with government databases. A report from the Department of Homeland Security found 477 breaches in 2006 alone," said Cohn. "The warrantless domestic surveillance going on now isn't just illegal -- it could expose your personal information to thieves and criminals."
 
The committee asked EFF for input as part of its review of the Protect America Act, deeply flawed legislation that broadly expanded the National Security Agency's authority to spy on Americans without warrants. Next week, the House is set to vote on the RESTORE Act, a bill designed restore the civil liberties lost under the previous law.
 
Since the committee had also sent a list of key questions to AT&T and the other major telecommunications firms about their involvement in illegal surveillance activities, EFF provided the committee information about the Hepting v. AT&T lawsuit. EFF represents the plaintiffs in this class-action lawsuit brought by AT&T customers, accusing the telecommunications company of violating their rights by illegally assisting the NSA's domestic surveillance. The Hepting case is just one of many suits aimed at holding telecoms responsible for knowingly violating federal privacy laws with warrantless wiretapping and the illegal transfer of vast amounts of personal data to the government.
 
EFF also provided the committee with a legal analysis of the use of so-called "exigent letters" by the government to obtain information about Americans and about their "communities of interest," two topics also raised by the committee in its letters to the telecommunications carriers. EFF's Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) work uncovered this illegal broadening of surveillance authority.
 
For EFF's full comments to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce: 
http://eff.org/Privacy/Surveillance/FISA/committee_letter.pdf
 
For more on the class-action lawsuit against AT&T:
http://www.eff.org/legal/cases/att