February 6, 2017

U.S. House of Representatives
Washington, D.C.  20515

Dear Representative,

On behalf of the more than one million members and supporters of the Council for Citizens Against Government Waste (CCAGW), I urge you to support H.R. 387, the Email Privacy Act, which provides a much-needed update to the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA).

ECPA was enacted in 1986, long before electronic communications and internet “cloud” storage were widely adopted.  This has left a disparity in the manner in which the law has been applied to new technologies.  H.R. 387 ends ECPA’s arbitrary “180-day rule,” which permits email communications to be obtained without a warrant after 180 days.  The legislation also rejects a Department of Justic interpretation of ECPA that the act of opening an email removes it from warrant protection, ratifying the Sixth Circuit Court decision in U.S. v. Warshak, which held that email content is protected by the Fourth Amendment and that law enforcement access requires a probable cause warrant.

By requiring a warrant for data stored electronically with third parties, this legislation will help American companies continue to innovate and compete globally while protecting consumer information from warrantless searches.  It eliminates outdated discrepancies between the legal process for government access to data stored locally in one’s home or office and the process for the same data stored with third parties in the cloud.

During the 114th Congress, the House of Representatives passed the Email Privacy Act by a unanimous vote, and the legislation enjoys wide bipartisan support.  I urge you to vote in favor of this legislation in order to ensure that the privacy of electronic communications is protected.  All votes pertaining to H.R. 387 will be among those considered in CCAGW’s 2017 Congressional Ratings.

Sincerely, 

Tom Schatz
President, CCAGW