White House Appoints Howard Schmidt ‘Cybersecurity Czar’
The Center for Democracy & Technology welcomes today's Presidential appointment of Howard Schmidt to be the White House’s first Cybersecurity chief. CDT believes he brings the needed expertise to a critical new position.
In May President Obama declared the nation's digital infrastructure a strategic national asset and pledged that his Administration would make protecting these networks a national security priority. With the appointment of Schmidt, the President has taken an important step in meeting that pledge.
"President Obama has outlined an ambitious cybersecurity agenda we have full confidence that Howard Schmidt has the knowledge and skills to lead the federal government in the execution of that plan," said CDT President Leslie Harris.
The Administration’s sixty-day review of cybersecurity efforts include strong commitments to ensure protections for individual privacy are built-into any policy involving national cybersecurity. CDT has been tracking the progress of this "cybersecurity privacy checklist."
CDT-led Coalition Calls for Transparency for White House AI Framework
CDT and Americans for Responsible Innovation led a broad, bipartisan coalition of over two dozen civil society groups in calling on the White House to release its Framework for review of frontier AI models.
CDT Amicus Brief Calls on Fourth Circuit to Rein In Geofence Warrants
Earlier this year the Supreme Court ruled in Chatrie v United States that the Fourth Amendment protected all cell phone location information, which CDT lauded as a landmark decision, but sent the case back down to the Fourth Circuit to assess the propriety of the geofence warrant at issue.
CDT and Partners Post Floor Alert Opposing CA SB 1013 Automated License Plate Readers Bill
The best way to ensure that Automated License Plate Readers are not abused is to limit the retention of stored data and to keep loopholes to lawful process closed. CA SB 1013 is a step in the wrong direction, and we urge the California legislature to reject this approach.
British Public Oppose Secret Surveillance Powers and Want Strong Protections for Encrypted Communications
CDT released nationally representative polling data revealing that a the British public are broadly concerned about the security, privacy, and free speech consequences of allowing law enforcement to access encrypted communications.
