On March 7, 2023
S.686 was born. It is called the Restricting Act S.686 was born. It is called the Restricting Act and was sent to committee as a Trojan horse to turn off TikTok through statute however, it is much more than that.
Sen. Linsey Graham who is a cosponsor of the bill, was asked about it on Jesse Waters program last night. Watch the video and see how he squirmed under Waters questioning.
https://www.foxnews.com/video/6323614622112RESTRICT is led by Mark Warner (D-VA) and John Thune (R-SD) and the bill is deliberately broad in scope. It is written with the stated intention of protecting American citizens from malicious software and telecommunications products deployed by overseas entities. The bill specifically only applies to technology that is linked to a "foreign adversary," including China, Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Russia, and Venezuela.
Unfortunately, due to the vague language in the bill, it could apply to almost any internet connection between a US citizen and those countries. That means you could be breaking the law if you are browsing the web and hit a link to Vkontakte, the "Russian Facebook." Likewise, if you watch TikTok videos after the ban, you could face criminal charges for doing so.
Of particular concern to privacy advocates are the RESTRICT Act's stated laws regarding the use of VPNs. As written, those who use a VPN to circumvent regional blocks on content. They could therefore be subject to as much as a million dollars in fines and up to 20 years in prison?an absolutely incredible penalty for something that could be as harmless as sharing a dumb meme with your friends.
S. Bill 686 sec3 a 1
(a) In General.?The Secretary, in consultation with the relevant executive department and agency heads, is authorized to and shall take action to identify, deter, disrupt, prevent, prohibit, investigate, or otherwise mitigate, including by negotiating, entering into, or imposing, and enforcing any mitigation measure to address any risk arising from any covered transaction by any person, or with respect to any property, subject to the jurisdiction of the United States that the Secretary determines?
(1) poses an undue or unacceptable risk of?
(A) sabotage or subversion of the design, integrity, manufacturing, production, distribution, installation, operation, or maintenance of information and communications technology products and services in the United States;
(B) catastrophic effects on the security or resilience of the critical infrastructure or digital economy of the United States;
(C) interfering in, or altering the result or reported result of a Federal election, as determined in coordination with the Attorney General, the Director of National Intelligence, the Secretary of Treasury, and the Federal Election Commission; or
(D) coercive or criminal activities by a foreign adversary that are designed to undermine democratic processes and institutions or steer policy and regulatory decisions in favor of the strategic objectives of a foreign adversary to the detriment of the national security of the United States, as determined in coordination with the Attorney General, the Director of National Intelligence, the Secretary of Treasury, and the Federal Election Commission; or
The bill says that the Secretary of Commerce will work with other executive-branch secretaries and directors to "take action to identify, deter, disrupt, prevent, prohibit, investigate, or otherwise mitigate, including by negotiating, entering into, or imposing and enforcing any mitigation measure to address any risk arising from any covered transaction by any person, or with respect to any property, subject to the jurisdiction of the United States." That is a lot of "any's".
It may be easy to dismiss the bill, but RESTRICT is as broad as the existing Patriot Act. In fact, many online privacy advocates have been drawing parallels between the two. Some even refer to RESTRICT as the "Patriot Act 2.0." It is also worth noting that the bill does not even mention TikTok by name, despite that being the original intention behind its drafting. - HotHardware
Spread the word folks. Unlike the emotions caused by 911 the Patriot Act was born, we have time to stop it.
