George Croner details the history, structure, legal requirements, and intelligence value of the Section 702 surveillance program and explains why the reauthorization of Section 702 is both perpetually challenging—and particularly challenging in 2023.
Croner identifies the most likely criticisms of Section 702 and examines the sources and merits of these critiques including in light of past congressional actions, FISA court opinions, Supreme Court jurisprudence, executive branch oversight, Intelligence community procedures, multinational data privacy efforts, and the FBI’s compliance problems.
Accordingly, Croner proposes examples of circumscribed solutions, such as limiting the FBI’s use of Section 702-derived information and USP query terms that would not compromise Section 702’s foreign intelligence value.