[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 162 (2016), Part 4]
[House]
[Pages 5206-5212]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           EMAIL PRIVACY ACT

  Mr. GOODLATTE. Mr. Speaker, I move that the House suspend the rules 
and pass the bill (H.R. 699) to amend title 18, United States Code, to 
update the privacy protections for electronic communications 
information that is stored by third-party service providers in order to 
protect consumer privacy interests while meeting law enforcement needs, 
and for other purposes, as amended.
  The Clerk read the title of the bill.
  The text of the bill is as follows:

                                H.R. 699

       Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of 
     the United States of America in Congress assembled,

     SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

       This Act may be cited as the ``Email Privacy Act''.

     SEC. 2. VOLUNTARY DISCLOSURE CORRECTIONS.

       (a) In General.--Section 2702 of title 18, United States 
     Code, is amended--
       (1) in subsection (a)--
       (A) in paragraph (1)--
       (i) by striking ``divulge'' and inserting ``disclose'';
       (ii) by striking ``while in electronic storage by that 
     service'' and inserting ``that is in electronic storage with 
     or otherwise stored, held, or maintained by that service'';
       (B) in paragraph (2)--
       (i) by striking ``to the public'';
       (ii) by striking ``divulge'' and inserting ``disclose''; 
     and
       (iii) by striking ``which is carried or maintained on that 
     service'' and inserting ``that is stored, held, or maintained 
     by that service''; and
       (C) in paragraph (3)--
       (i) by striking ``divulge'' and inserting ``disclose''; and
       (ii) by striking ``a provider of'' and inserting ``a person 
     or entity providing''
       (2) in subsection (b)--
       (A) in the matter preceding paragraph (1), by inserting 
     ``wire or electronic'' before ``communication'';
       (B) by amending paragraph (1) to read as follows:
       ``(1) to an originator, addressee, or intended recipient of 
     such communication, to the subscriber or customer on whose 
     behalf the provider stores, holds, or maintains such 
     communication, or to an agent of such addressee, intended 
     recipient, subscriber, or customer;''; and
       (C) by amending paragraph (3) to read as follows:
       ``(3) with the lawful consent of the originator, addressee, 
     or intended recipient of such communication, or of the 
     subscriber or customer on whose behalf the provider stores, 
     holds, or maintains such communication;'';
       (3) in subsection (c) by inserting ``wire or electronic'' 
     before ``communications'';
       (4) in each of subsections (b) and (c), by striking 
     ``divulge'' and inserting ``disclose''; and
       (5) in subsection (c), by amending paragraph (2) to read as 
     follows:
       ``(2) with the lawful consent of the subscriber or 
     customer;''.

     SEC. 3. AMENDMENTS TO REQUIRED DISCLOSURE SECTION.

       Section 2703 of title 18, United States Code, is amended--
       (1) by striking subsections (a) through (c) and inserting 
     the following:
       ``(a) Contents of Wire or Electronic Communications in 
     Electronic Storage.--Except as provided in subsections (i) 
     and (j), a governmental entity may require the disclosure by 
     a provider of electronic communication service of the 
     contents of a wire or electronic communication that is in 
     electronic storage with or otherwise stored, held, or 
     maintained by that service only if the governmental entity 
     obtains a warrant issued using the procedures described in 
     the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure (or, in the case of a 
     State court, issued using State warrant procedures) that--
       ``(1) is issued by a court of competent jurisdiction; and
       ``(2) may indicate the date by which the provider must make 
     the disclosure to the governmental entity.

     In the absence of a date on the warrant indicating the date 
     by which the provider must make disclosure to the 
     governmental entity, the provider shall promptly respond to 
     the warrant.
       ``(b) Contents of Wire or Electronic Communications in a 
     Remote Computing Service.--
       ``(1) In general.--Except as provided in subsections (i) 
     and (j), a governmental entity may require the disclosure by 
     a provider of remote computing service of the contents of a 
     wire or electronic communication that is stored, held, or 
     maintained by that service only if the governmental entity 
     obtains a warrant issued using the procedures described in 
     the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure (or, in the case of a 
     State court, issued using State warrant procedures) that--
       ``(A) is issued by a court of competent jurisdiction; and
       ``(B) may indicate the date by which the provider must make 
     the disclosure to the governmental entity.

     In the absence of a date on the warrant indicating the date 
     by which the provider must make disclosure to the 
     governmental entity, the provider shall promptly respond to 
     the warrant.
       ``(2) Applicability.--Paragraph (1) is applicable with 
     respect to any wire or electronic communication that is 
     stored, held, or maintained by the provider--
       ``(A) on behalf of, and received by means of electronic 
     transmission from (or created by means of computer processing 
     of communication received by means of electronic transmission 
     from), a subscriber or customer of such remote computing 
     service; and
       ``(B) solely for the purpose of providing storage or 
     computer processing services to such subscriber or customer, 
     if the provider is not authorized to access the contents of 
     any such communications for purposes of providing any 
     services other than storage or computer processing.
       ``(c) Records Concerning Electronic Communication Service 
     or Remote Computing Service.--
       ``(1) In general.--Except as provided in subsections (i) 
     and (j), a governmental entity may require the disclosure by 
     a provider of electronic communication service or remote 
     computing service of a record or other information pertaining 
     to a subscriber to or customer of such service (not including 
     the contents of wire or electronic communications), only--
       ``(A) if a governmental entity obtains a warrant issued 
     using the procedures described in the Federal Rules of 
     Criminal Procedure (or, in the case of a State court, issued 
     using State warrant procedures) that--
       ``(i) is issued by a court of competent jurisdiction 
     directing the disclosure; and
       ``(ii) may indicate the date by which the provider must 
     make the disclosure to the governmental entity;
       ``(B) if a governmental entity obtains a court order 
     directing the disclosure under subsection (d);
       ``(C) with the lawful consent of the subscriber or 
     customer; or
       ``(D) as otherwise authorized in paragraph (2).
       ``(2) Subscriber or customer information.--A provider of 
     electronic communication service or remote computing service 
     shall, in response to an administrative subpoena authorized 
     by Federal or State statute, a grand jury, trial, or civil 
     discovery subpoena, or any means available under paragraph 
     (1), disclose to a governmental entity the--
       ``(A) name;
       ``(B) address;
       ``(C) local and long distance telephone connection records, 
     or records of session times and durations;
       ``(D) length of service (including start date) and types of 
     service used;
       ``(E) telephone or instrument number or other subscriber or 
     customer number or identity, including any temporarily 
     assigned network address; and
       ``(F) means and source of payment for such service 
     (including any credit card or bank account number);
     of a subscriber or customer of such service.
       ``(3) Notice not required.--A governmental entity that 
     receives records or information under this subsection is not 
     required to provide notice to a subscriber or customer.'';
       (2) in subsection (d)--
       (A) by striking ``(b) or'';
       (B) by striking ``the contents of a wire or electronic 
     communication, or'';
       (C) by striking ``sought,'' and inserting ``sought''; and
       (D) by striking ``section'' and inserting ``subsection''; 
     and
       (3) by adding at the end the following:
       ``(h) Notice.--Except as provided in section 2705, a 
     provider of electronic communication service or remote 
     computing service may notify a subscriber or customer of a 
     receipt of a warrant, court order, subpoena, or request under 
     subsection (a), (b), (c), or (d) of this section.
       ``(i) Rule of Construction Related to Legal Process.--
     Nothing in this section or in section 2702 shall limit the 
     authority of a governmental entity to use an administrative 
     subpoena authorized by Federal or State statute, a grand 
     jury, trial, or civil discovery subpoena, or a warrant issued 
     using the procedures described in the Federal Rules of 
     Criminal Procedure (or, in the case of a State court, issued 
     using State warrant procedures) by a court of competent 
     jurisdiction to--
       ``(1) require an originator, addressee, or intended 
     recipient of a wire or electronic communication to disclose a 
     wire or electronic communication (including the contents of 
     that communication) to the governmental entity;
       ``(2) require a person or entity that provides an 
     electronic communication service to the officers, directors, 
     employees, or agents of the person or entity (for the purpose 
     of carrying out

[[Page 5207]]

     their duties) to disclose a wire or electronic communication 
     (including the contents of that communication) to or from the 
     person or entity itself or to or from an officer, director, 
     employee, or agent of the entity to a governmental entity, if 
     the wire or electronic communication is stored, held, or 
     maintained on an electronic communications system owned, 
     operated, or controlled by the person or entity; or
       ``(3) require a person or entity that provides a remote 
     computing service or electronic communication service to 
     disclose a wire or electronic communication (including the 
     contents of that communication) that advertises or promotes a 
     product or service and that has been made readily accessible 
     to the general public.
       ``(j) Rule of Construction Related to Congressional 
     Subpoenas.--Nothing in this section or in section 2702 shall 
     limit the power of inquiry vested in the Congress by Article 
     I of the Constitution of the United States, including the 
     authority to compel the production of a wire or electronic 
     communication (including the contents of a wire or electronic 
     communication) that is stored, held, or maintained by a 
     person or entity that provides remote computing service or 
     electronic communication service.''.

     SEC. 4. DELAYED NOTICE.

       Section 2705 of title 18, United States Code, is amended to 
     read as follows:

     ``Sec. 2705. Delayed notice

       ``(a) In General.--A governmental entity acting under 
     section 2703 may apply to a court for an order directing a 
     provider of electronic communication service or remote 
     computing service to which a warrant, order, subpoena, or 
     other directive under section 2703 is directed not to notify 
     any other person of the existence of the warrant, order, 
     subpoena, or other directive.
       ``(b) Determination.--A court shall grant a request for an 
     order made under subsection (a) for delayed notification of 
     up to 180 days if the court determines that there is reason 
     to believe that notification of the existence of the warrant, 
     order, subpoena, or other directive will likely result in--
       ``(1) endangering the life or physical safety of an 
     individual;
       ``(2) flight from prosecution;
       ``(3) destruction of or tampering with evidence;
       ``(4) intimidation of potential witnesses; or
       ``(5) otherwise seriously jeopardizing an investigation or 
     unduly delaying a trial.
       ``(c) Extension.--Upon request by a governmental entity, a 
     court may grant one or more extensions, for periods of up to 
     180 days each, of an order granted in accordance with 
     subsection (b).''.

     SEC. 5. RULE OF CONSTRUCTION.

       Nothing in this Act or an amendment made by this Act shall 
     be construed to preclude the acquisition by the United States 
     Government of--
       (1) the contents of a wire or electronic communication 
     pursuant to other lawful authorities, including the 
     authorities under chapter 119 of title 18 (commonly known as 
     the ``Wiretap Act''), the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance 
     Act of 1978 (50 U.S.C. 1801 et seq.), or any other provision 
     of Federal law not specifically amended by this Act; or
       (2) records or other information relating to a subscriber 
     or customer of any electronic communication service or remote 
     computing service (not including the content of such 
     communications) pursuant to the Foreign Intelligence 
     Surveillance Act of 1978 (50 U.S.C. 1801 et seq.), chapter 
     119 of title 18 (commonly known as the ``Wiretap Act''), or 
     any other provision of Federal law not specifically amended 
     by this Act.

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to the rule, the gentleman from 
Virginia (Mr. Goodlatte) and the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Conyers) 
each will control 20 minutes.
  The Chair recognizes the gentleman from Virginia.


                             General Leave

  Mr. GOODLATTE. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members 
may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks 
and include extraneous materials on H.R. 699, currently under 
consideration.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Is there objection to the request of the 
gentleman from Virginia?
  There was no objection.
  Mr. GOODLATTE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may 
consume.
  Today is an historic day. Today, the House of Representatives will be 
the first Chamber in Congress to approve legislation that has been 
pending before the House and Senate for several years to reform and 
modernize the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, or ECPA. Reforming 
this outdated law has been a priority for me as chairman of the 
Judiciary Committee. I have worked with Members of Congress, advocacy 
groups, and law enforcement agencies for years on many complicated 
nuances involved in updating this law.
  Two weeks ago, the House Judiciary Committee unanimously reported a 
revised version of H.R. 699, the Email Privacy Act. The resulting bill 
is a carefully negotiated agreement to update the procedures governing 
government access to stored communications content and records.
  Thirty years ago, when personal computing was still in its infancy 
and few of us had ever heard of something called the World Wide Web, 
Congress enacted ECPA to establish procedures that strike ``a fair 
balance between the privacy expectations of American citizens and the 
legitimate needs of law enforcement agencies.''
  In 1986, mail was sent through the U.S. Postal Service, a search 
engine was called a library, tweets were the sounds made by birds in 
the trees, and clouds were found only in the sky. In 1986, computer 
storage was finite and expensive. It was unheard of that a commercial 
product would allow users to send and receive electronic communications 
around the globe for free and store those communications for years with 
a third-party provider.
  So much has changed in the last three decades. The technology 
explosion over the last three decades has placed a great deal of 
information on the Internet, in our emails, and on the cloud. Today, 
commercial providers, businesses, schools, and governments of all 
shapes and sizes provide email and cloud computing services to 
customers, students, and employees.
  The Email Privacy Act establishes, for the first time in Federal 
statute, a uniform warrant requirement for stored communication content 
in criminal investigations, regardless of the type of service provider, 
the age of an email, or whether the email has been opened.
  The bill preserves the authority for law enforcement agents to serve 
the warrant on the provider because, as with any other third-party 
custodian, the information sought is stored with them. However, the 
bill acknowledges that providers may give notice to their customers 
when in receipt of a warrant, court order, or subpoena, unless the 
provider is court-ordered to delay such notification.
  The bill continues current practice that delineates which remote 
computing service providers, or cloud providers, are subject to the 
warrant requirement for content in a criminal investigation.
  ECPA has traditionally imposed heightened legal process and 
procedures to obtain information for which the customer has a 
reasonable expectation of privacy, namely, emails, texts, photos, 
videos, and documents stored in the cloud. H.R. 699 preserves this 
treatment by maintaining in the statute limiting language regarding 
remote computing services.
  Contrary to practice 30 years ago, today, vast amounts of private, 
sensitive information are transmitted and stored electronically. But 
this information may also contain evidence of a crime, and law 
enforcement agencies are increasingly dependent on stored 
communications content and records in their investigations.
  To facilitate timely disclosure of evidence to law enforcement, the 
bill authorizes a court to require a date for return of service of the 
warrant. In the absence of such a requirement, H.R. 699 requires email 
and cloud providers to promptly respond to warrants for communications 
content.
  Current law makes no distinction between content disclosed to the 
public, like an advertisement on a Web site, versus content disclosed 
only to one or a handful of persons, like an email or a text message. 
The result is that law enforcement could be required to obtain a 
warrant even for publicly disclosed content. The bill clarifies that 
commercial public content can be obtained with process other than a 
warrant.
  Lastly, H.R. 699 clarifies that nothing in the law limits Congress' 
authority to compel a third-party provider to disclose content in 
furtherance of its investigative and oversight responsibilities.
  Thirty years ago, the extent to which people communicated 
electronically was much more limited. Today, however, the ubiquity of 
electronic communications requires Congress to ensure that legitimate 
expectations of privacy are protected, while respecting the needs of 
law enforcement.
  I am confident that this bill strikes the necessary balance and does 
so in a

[[Page 5208]]

way that continues to promote the development and use of new 
technologies and services that reflect how people communicate with one 
another today and into the future.
  I would like to thank Congressman Yoder and Congressman Polis for 
introducing the underlying legislation and for working with the 
committee on improvements to the bill.
  With this historic vote today, Congress will approve legislation that 
embodies the principles of the Fourth Amendment and reaffirms our 
commitment to protecting the privacy interests of the American people 
without unduly sacrificing public safety.
  I urge my colleagues to support this bipartisan legislation.
  I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  In 2014, in a unanimous ruling delivered by Chief Justice Roberts, 
the Supreme Court concluded that the police may not search a cell phone 
without first demonstrating probable cause. Citing an obvious Fourth 
Amendment interest in the vast amount of data we store on our personal 
devices, the Court wrote: ``The fact that technology now allows an 
individual to carry such information in his hand does not make the 
information any less worthy of the protection for which the Founders 
fought. Our answer to the question of what police must do before 
searching a cell phone seized incident to an arrest is accordingly 
simple--get a warrant.''
  With that decision, the Court took a bold step toward reconciling the 
Fourth Amendment with the advent of modern communications technology. 
Today, the House takes a similar step to reconcile our interests in 
privacy and due process with the realities of modern computing.
  H.R. 699, the Email Privacy Act, recognizes that the content of our 
communications, although often stored in digital format, remains worthy 
of Fourth Amendment protection. And to the investigators and government 
agents who seek access to our email, our advice is accordingly simple: 
Get a warrant. It is an idea whose time has long since come. This bill 
will allow us to move to a clear, uniform standard for law enforcement 
agencies to access the content of our communications, namely, a warrant 
based on probable cause.
  H.R. 699 also codifies the right of the providers to give notice of 
this intrusion to their customers, except in certain exigent 
circumstances that must also be validated by the court.

                              {time}  1415

  We should note the absence of a special carve-out from the warrant 
requirement for the civil agencies, like the Securities and Exchange 
Commission and the Internal Revenue Service. In the House Judiciary 
Committee, we reached quick consensus that a civil carve-out of any 
kind is unworkable, unconstitutional, or both. I would have preferred 
to have kept the notice provisions of the original bill, which are 
absent from the version we reported from committee.
  In the digital world, no amount of due diligence necessarily tells us 
that the government has accessed our electronic communications. The 
government should have an obligation to provide us with some form of 
notice when intruding on a record of our most private conversations; 
but I understand that not everyone shares this view, and I am willing 
to compromise, for now, in order to advance the important reforms that 
we will adopt today.
  I am proud of the work we have done. This legislation is several 
years in the making, and it should not be delayed any further. I 
compliment our colleague Mr. Polis. Accordingly, I urge my colleagues 
to support H.R. 699, the Email Privacy Act.
  I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. GOODLATTE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 5 minutes to the gentleman from 
Kansas (Mr. Yoder), the chief sponsor of the legislation.
  Mr. YODER. I thank the chairman.
  Mr. Speaker, today is a great day for the Constitution. It is a great 
day for the spirit of bipartisanship in this Chamber. It is a great day 
for Americans everywhere who use modern technology, such as emails and 
text messages and cell phones, to communicate with one another.
  This day has been a long time in the making, and I want to thank the 
chairman and his staff, Ranking Member Conyers, my colleague Mr. Polis, 
and everyone who has worked on this legislation. This is the most 
cosponsored bill in the entire United States House--the most popular 
bill--because it is a commonsense piece of legislation that affects 
every American and will clear up a long-time hole in the law that has 
allowed the government to intrude on Americans' privacy.
  You have to go back to 1986 when this law was passed: Halley's Comet 
was passing by Earth; ``Top Gun'' was coming out as a new movie; 
Cabbage Patch dolls were flying off the shelves. It was a good time in 
America. It was also the time in which Congress last wrote the laws 
that updated the Electronic Communications Privacy Act. At that point, 
there were only 10 million Americans who even had email accounts. 
Today, there is an estimated 232 million Americans who have email 
accounts. It wasn't until 6 years later that someone sent the first 
text message in 1992. Yet, now, we expect 1 billion text messages to be 
sent every single year.
  The current law, which is the law that was written in 1986, allows an 
abuse of our constitutional rights by treating our digital information 
as if it is not private information--as if it can be searched and 
seized by the government without a warrant, without probable cause, 
without due process. The theory in 1986 was, if you left your email on 
a server, once it was left there, it was considered abandoned. It was 
like trash that was left out on the street corner, which didn't have an 
expectation of privacy anymore. We know the ways that Americans 
communicate today is in a way in which they expect that those 
transmissions are private, and they expect that the government will 
honor that and not search those emails or capture them for other 
purposes. The Fourth Amendment is being violated.
  Today, we restore the Fourth Amendment by treating digital 
information just like paper information, and we stand strong on the 
notion that Americans do have an expectation of privacy in their email 
accounts. I would think, if I and my colleagues would each ask our 
constituents if they expect that their email conversations are private, 
they would know that they are, and they would expect that they are. As 
we are debating this bill, Americans are sending emails and text 
messages back and forth, and they expect that their government is not 
reviewing those.
  What we do in this legislation is require a warrant. We say the 
government must have probable cause. They must go to a judge whether it 
is at the Federal level, the State level, or the local level. To review 
those pieces of digital information that are stored either in a drop 
box or on the iCloud--or just a text message that is sent back and 
forth--you have to have a warrant, and in a civil matter, you have to 
have a subpoena, and that subpoena is served on the individual.
  We have documents on our desks at home. The police can't kick in your 
door and go read those documents unless they have a warrant backed up 
on probable cause. We have a digital set of documents that goes around 
with us wherever we go. There is a file cabinet with us. When we store 
things, we are doing so not because we are abandoning it. We are 
storing it because we are wanting to protect it, and we are wanting to 
ensure that we can keep it. We don't want to lose our Fourth Amendment 
protections because of that. This legislation would require that a 
warrant or a civil subpoena exist in order to read that information so 
that due process occurs.
  This is a great unifier. Quite often on the House floor, we are 
divided--Republicans and Democrats--and we are not able to find 
resolution on some of the biggest challenges that face us; but the 
Fourth Amendment in the Constitution has to be preserved. I am 
heartened by the fact that my colleague Mr. Polis and groups on the 
left and groups on the right and groups in the center and that America 
has come together on this legislation to say we are going to

[[Page 5209]]

fix this, and we are going to ensure that this Congress modernizes its 
laws and that it does so in a bipartisan fashion so that we can put 
this bill on the President's desk and he will sign it into law. As we 
continue to advance, we must remember to advance the laws that this 
country utilizes, and as Americans communicate in different ways, we 
have to modernize the way the laws treat that communication.
  I am proud of the work we are doing in the House today. I thank the 
chairman and his team. I thank Ranking Member Conyers and my colleagues 
on both sides of the aisle. This is a great day for America, a great 
day for the Constitution, and a great day for each and every one of us 
who uses email to correspond to know that the Fourth Amendment 
continues to protect us and to know that the Internet is not immune 
from the protections of the Constitution.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from 
Colorado (Mr. Polis), one of the authors of the measure before us.
  Mr. POLIS. Mr. Speaker, the passage of the Email Privacy Act is an 
enormous victory. It is a victory for all Americans who believe in the 
right to privacy, in the Fourth Amendment, and in due process.
  The Email Privacy Act mandates, for the first time, that Americans 
have the same legal protection for their emails as they do for papers, 
letters, faxes, and other old communications. The bill protects those 
of us--myself included and many Members of this body--who have email 
accounts in the cloud. Maybe it is Google mail or Yahoo Mail or AOL or 
other email accounts on their hard drives. It makes sure that the 
government doesn't have the right, without a warrant, to search emails 
that are older than 180 days.
  This bill is also a victory for bipartisanship. When I introduced the 
bill, along with my colleague Mr. Yoder, in the winter of 2015, we knew 
it would be popular. Yet, as this bill sits before us today, ready for 
passage, I am very proud to say it has garnered 314 cosponsors, and it 
stands as the single most popular bill in this session of the House of 
Representatives. I am excited that it is scheduled for a floor vote.
  When Congress passed the Electronic Communications Privacy Act in 
1986, electronic communications were different than they are today. 
They didn't really exist as such. A few professors were using a 
predecessor for the Internet. It was not a mass form of communication. 
Today, with 24/7 accessibility with mobile devices and laptops, over 
205 billion emails are sent every day, according to some estimates, 
including many that contain our private communications for millions of 
Americans who deserve the same right to privacy as documents in a file 
cabinet.
  With the passage of the Email Privacy Act, Congress will ensure that 
your emails that are older than 180 days are subject to the same 
protection under the Fourth Amendment. You often hear Members on both 
sides of the aisle talk about commonsense bills. When you read our bill 
and when you look at the immense support, there is nothing more common 
sense than the Email Privacy Act.
  I urge my colleagues to vote ``yes'' and pass the bill. I urge the 
Senate to take it up and act. There is the unanimous support from the 
House Judiciary Committee and, as of today--hopefully soon--
overwhelming support on the floor of the House. This bill should be 
passed. It should be brought to the desk of the President of the United 
States. We should finally bring our email privacy laws into the 21st 
century.
  Mr. GOODLATTE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from 
Texas (Mr. Poe), a member of the Judiciary Committee.
  Mr. POE of Texas. I thank the chairman for bringing this bill up and 
for his work on it in a bipartisan way.
  I especially want to thank Congressman Yoder for pushing this 
legislation that has overwhelming support in the House of 
Representatives.
  Mr. Speaker, the Electronic Communications Privacy Act was passed in 
1986--30 years ago. It was an eternity. Understand that IBM invented 
and put on the market its first laptop in 1986. A lot has changed since 
that day 30 years ago. As the chairman mentioned, the cloud was where 
rain came from, or sometimes we see it here in Washington, D.C.--the 
cloud. No one even knew what that was. The Electronic Communications 
Privacy Act needs to be fixed because it does not protect the right of 
privacy of Americans.
  If something is stored in the cloud that is over 180 days old, then 
it is open season for government to seize all of that information. All 
governments--local or State or Federal--can go in and get those emails, 
texts, photographs, documents that you are storing. Up to 180 days, it 
is protected by the Constitution. Interesting--180 days of 
constitutional rights--but on the 181st day, you have no right of 
privacy. That is absurd. This bill fixes that former legislation.
  I used to be a judge in Texas for 22 years, and I had peace officers 
all the time come to see me who wanted a warrant. They followed the 
Fourth Amendment and described the place to be searched. They would go 
in with that warrant, after stating probable cause, and they were 
allowed to seize whatever they could seize under the warrant. The 
Fourth Amendment ought to apply today. It ought to apply in the 
electronic age. It ought to apply to emails that are stored in the 
cloud or to anything else that is stored in the cloud. If the police 
officers have to have a warrant to go into your house and take 
documents you store in your desk or wherever, then they have to have a 
warrant if you store documents in the cloud. That is what this 
legislation does, and it makes sense that we protect the constitutional 
right.
  The government cannot tap our phones without a warrant, it can't read 
hard mail without a warrant, and it can't enter our homes without a 
warrant because of the Fourth Amendment. We are unique among all 
peoples because we have in our Constitution the Fourth Amendment that 
protects Americans--I think better than any other population anywhere--
of their rights.
  Speaking of rights, the government doesn't have rights. People have 
rights, and the Bill of Rights protects the citizens of the United 
States. Government has authority--it has power--and if you read the 
Bill of Rights, the 10 Amendments especially, it is to limit government 
power and authority against us, the citizens. So, of course, the Fourth 
Amendment should apply to the Federal Government in this area.
  Unfortunately, we have seen in our own government abuses of the 
government in the area, especially of snooping and spying on Americans, 
with the NSA and its story that we are all familiar with. We have to 
control government, and it is our obligation, the House of 
Representatives, to protect the Constitution--the Bill of Rights 
especially--from government intrusion.
  I support this legislation. It is a good piece of legislation. I 
thank the chairman and the ranking member and Ms. Lofgren for her 
support of this legislation that we have been working on for a long 
time. Let Congress speak out and support the right of privacy for all 
Americans and keep the government out of the snooping business.
  And that is just the way it is.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from New 
York (Mr. Nadler), a senior member of the House Judiciary Committee.
  Mr. NADLER. I thank the chairman.
  Mr. Speaker, I rise to support the Email Privacy Act.
  It has long been evident that we need to update the laws impacting 
electronic communications and privacy. I am pleased that, today, the 
House will take a major step forward by considering and approving the 
Email Privacy Act. Its passage is long overdue.
  In 2009 and 2010, when I was the chair of the House Judiciary 
Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties, we 
held multiple hearings on ECPA, or electronic communication and privacy 
laws, and began to seriously consider reforms to our Nation's 
electronic communication and privacy laws. During the 112th Congress, 
Representative Conyers and I introduced the Electronic Communications 
Privacy Act Modernization Act of 2012, which would have required law 
enforcement to obtain a warrant based on

[[Page 5210]]

probable cause before searching email. That approach, now embodied in 
the Yoder-Polis Email Privacy Act, is what we are here to consider 
today.
  The Email Privacy Act requires the government to obtain a warrant in 
order to access people's electronic communications from a third-party 
provider, protecting Americans' privacy rights while still enabling law 
enforcement to do its job.

                              {time}  1430

  This is consistent with a stark American practice going back to the 
Fourth Amendment. Current law is inconsistent and unclear regarding the 
standards for government access to the content of communications, and a 
single email is potentially subject to multiple different legal 
standards.
  Clarifying the laws will help industry stakeholders, who currently 
struggle to apply the existing, outdated categories of information to 
their products and services, and it will provide a clear standard for 
law enforcement.
  In an era where government access to people's private information 
held by third-party providers has become far too easy, Congress is 
finally taking steps to update our laws to reflect our new 
understanding of what it means for ``people to be secure in their 
persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and 
seizures,'' in the words of the Fourth Amendment.
  This bill is not perfect, and clearly there is more to be done. In 
particular, we must ensure that we keep working to require a probable 
cause warrant for location information.
  I am pleased that Chairman Goodlatte has announced that he plans to 
hold hearings on location information, and I look forward to those 
hearings and to subsequent legislation.
  I am proud to be an original cosponsor of this bill, and I applaud 
the House for considering this landmark legislation today.
  I urge my colleagues to support the passage of this bill to ensure 
that our laws strike the right balance between the interests and needs 
of law enforcement and the privacy rights of the American people.
  Mr. GOODLATTE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
South Carolina (Mr. Sanford).
  Mr. SANFORD. Mr. Speaker, I want to applaud my colleagues from Kansas 
and from Colorado for their work in crafting this bill. I think it is 
awfully important.
  I think it is what people expect. When they think about government, 
they want a government that works for them. Part of having a government 
that works for them means actually updating laws as technology has 
changed.
  So I think that, at the core, this is about keeping current with the 
rate of change in the world of technology.
  It is amazing to me--I pulled the numbers--that there are roughly 205 
billion emails sent every day around the world. If you presuppose that 
America's economy is about 20 percent of that world pie, that means 
around 40 million or more emails are sent across this country every 
single day.
  In contrast is the U.S. Postal Service. There are about 600 million 
letters that go across this country every day, which is to say, 
mathematically, you are saying that about 1.5 percent of the 
communication flow, either via mail or electronic means, are sent by 
the Postal Service.
  The other, in essence, 99 percent of the communications are sent via 
email, which is to say we have a real problem with a law that was 
created in the 1980s that doesn't take into account the way the world 
has changed.
  So I applaud the crafters of this bill for what they have done in 
recognizing technology change. I applaud them for the way that they 
stayed true to the Fourth Amendment.
  Our Founding Fathers were so deliberate in recognizing the notion 
that you didn't want to have British soldiers coming into a house and 
rumbling around until they finally found something to charge you with 
and then moving forward.
  The Fourth Amendment is about protecting individual liberty. 
Jefferson said: ``The natural progress of things is for the government 
to gain ground and for liberty to yield.''
  Fundamentally, what this bill is about is pushing back in the way 
that the government has now encroached on that space of individual 
liberty.
  Finally, I would say simply this: This is about recognizing how true 
history is on the importance of protecting liberty.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Costello of Pennsylvania). The time of 
the gentleman has expired.
  Mr. GOODLATTE. Mr. Speaker, I yield an additional 1 minute to the 
gentleman from South Carolina.
  Mr. SANFORD. Mr. Speaker, Edward Gibbon wrote a book back in 1776 
about the fall of the Romans. In it, he harkens back to the fall of 
Greece and the Athenians.
  He said, at the end of the day, in the end, more than they wanted 
freedom, they wanted security. They wanted a comfortable life, and they 
lost it all--security, comfort, and freedom--when the Athenians no 
longer wanted to give to society, but to receive. And he goes on with a 
long quote from there.
  He talks about the fundamental tension that exists in any developed 
society between freedom and security. We have moved too far in the 
opposite direction as it relates to email. This bill brings us back 
toward the center.
  I again applaud Mr. Yoder and Mr. Polis for what they have done. I 
also applaud Chairman Goodlatte for what he has done on this front.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentlewoman from 
Washington (Ms. DelBene), a very effective member on the Judiciary 
Committee.
  Ms. DelBENE. Mr. Speaker, updating our laws to reflect the way the 
world works in the 21st century has been one of my top priorities in 
Congress.
  After spending two decades in the technology sector where things 
change at light speed, it can be hard to understand why we still have 
laws on the books that don't reflect how society functions in the 
digital age. Nowhere has this been more obvious than in our email 
privacy laws that date back to the 1980s.
  Under current law, there are more protections for a letter in a 
filing cabinet than an email on a server. This was never really the 
intent, but email's evolution has made it clear that our policies are 
woefully outdated.
  I have supported a number of different proposals to reform our 
electronic privacy laws, and I will continue to push for those. Today's 
vote on the Email Privacy Act is a great step forward for American 
civil liberties.
  I urge all of my colleagues to vote ``yes'' on this important 
legislation, and I urge our friends in the Senate to take up the bill 
without delay so we can send it to the President and ensure Americans 
are guaranteed the privacy protections most think that they already 
have.
  Mr. GOODLATTE. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.
  Mr. CONYERS. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume.
  I would like to close today by thanking Chairman Goodlatte of the 
Judiciary Committee and his staff for working with us to develop the 
final draft of this legislation. Once again the chairman has helped us 
find a way to resolve our differences and advance core civil liberties 
and constitutional values.
  I would also like to thank the gentleman from Kansas (Mr. Yoder) and 
the gentleman from Colorado (Mr. Polis) for their leadership on this 
issue from the very beginning.
  The Email Privacy Act comes to the floor today in large part because 
of your work in gathering more than 300 cosponsors for this bill.
  Finally, I want to express appreciation to the coalition of 
technology companies, civil liberties organizations, and individual 
experts whose persistence and dedication have made this moment 
possible.
  I urge my colleagues to support H.R. 699, the Email Privacy Act. I 
believe that they will do so. I also urge our comparable body in the 
Senate to take up this measure as quickly as possible.
  I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. GOODLATTE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 2 minutes to the gentleman from 
Louisiana (Mr. Scalise), the majority whip.

[[Page 5211]]


  Mr. SCALISE. Mr. Speaker, I thank Chairman Goodlatte for moving this 
bill through his committee. I especially thank Congressman Yoder of 
Kansas for bringing this bill forward and for being bold enough to say 
let's modernize a law that is so outdated that it goes back to 1986, 
governing email communication when we didn't even have email and text 
messages.
  Why do we want to do this? We want to do it because Federal agencies 
are abusing this law to invade the privacy of hardworking, law-abiding 
citizens all across this country.
  Mr. Speaker, this is a document from the Internal Revenue Service 
titled ``Search Warrant Handbook.'' In this document by the IRS, their 
protocol says: ``In general, the Fourth Amendment does not protect 
communications held in electronic storage, such as email messages 
stored on a server, because internet users do not have a reasonable 
expectation of privacy in such communications.''
  The IRS has made it clear that they don't believe that American 
citizens have a Fourth Amendment protection of privacy for their email 
communications. The IRS has gone further and is actually reading emails 
of American citizens, and no one across the country knows about it 
unless the IRS finds something that then they are going to go after you 
criminally on.
  So they are reading the private emails, Mr. Speaker, of American 
citizens every single day, and they have been doing it for years. It is 
time for this abuse of power to end.
  We need to pass this bill with strong bipartisan support, send it 
over to the Senate, and get it to the President's desk so that American 
citizens have real privacy protections that they deserve, that they 
think they have, but they don't have, Mr. Speaker, because Federal 
agencies like the IRS today are reading the private emails of American 
citizens and using them against them.
  It is wrong. They ought to go get a warrant, but they should not be 
reading our private emails when people haven't done anything wrong.
  Let's pass this bill.
  Mr. GOODLATTE. Mr. Speaker, how much time is remaining?
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Virginia has 1\1/2\ 
minutes remaining.
  Mr. GOODLATTE. Mr. Speaker, I yield 45 seconds to the gentleman from 
Texas (Mr. Farenthold), a member of the Judiciary Committee.
  Mr. FARENTHOLD. Mr. Speaker, we are here today talking about 
modernizing a law, but we are modernizing a law that encompasses a 
centuries-old principle.
  Back in the days when the Founding Fathers wrote our Constitution, 
they were concerned about the government rifling through our papers. 
Today we have electronic papers. Stuff is stored in the cloud.
  This piece of legislation brings us back in line with the intent of 
the Founding Fathers that the government can't just rifle through your 
papers.
  I urge my colleagues to support it.
  Mr. GOODLATTE. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself the balance of my time.
  I want to take this time to thank the ranking member, the gentleman 
from Michigan (Mr. Conyers), and many Members on his side of the aisle, 
including Mr. Polis.
  I especially want to thank Mr. Yoder, who has worked long and hard on 
this legislation for which he is the chief sponsor.
  I most especially want to take note of the fact that we have very 
disparate points of view from a whole array of people around this 
country, from law enforcement, to technology companies, to civil 
liberties organizations. It took a long time to sort through that and 
find the common ground that is the legislation we have before us today.
  That ground would not have been found without the outstanding work of 
our staff, most especially Caroline Lynch, the chief counsel of the 
Judiciary Committee's Crime, Terrorism, Homeland Security, and 
Investigations Subcommittee, and her able team of attorneys, and Aaron 
Hiller, minority counsel as well.
  They deserve a great deal of gratitude for the years of work to bring 
us to this point where we can pass this important, important 
legislation by what I believe will be a resounding majority.
  I yield back the balance of my time.
  Mr. SWALWELL of California. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 
699, the Email Privacy Act.
  Current law protecting electronic privacy is drastically out of step 
with modern technology, and H.R. 699 represents a long overdue update. 
This bill would provide Americans the privacy protections in their 
electronic communications they expect and deserve.
  While it is important that the House advance H.R. 699 today, no bill 
is perfect. Law enforcement has raised a few concerns about it, such as 
that it does not provide them the ability to access critical 
information quickly enough. As a former prosecutor, I take their views 
seriously. I hope we can continue the dialogue with law enforcement and 
consider ways to improve the bill as it moves along in the legislative 
process.
  I encourage all Members to support H.R. 699.
  Ms. JACKSON LEE. Mr. Speaker, I rise in support of H.R. 699, the 
Email Privacy Act.
  This is an important and long negotiated bill that will update the 
Electronic Communications Privacy Act, a law that both protects the 
privacy of our email communications and provides a critical tool for 
law enforcement to investigate crime.
  I want to thank Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte and Ranking Member 
John Conyers for their leadership and for working together on this 
legislation to accomplish the goals of this bill for the benefit and 
protection of citizens, law enforcement, and communications providers.
  I am an original cosponsor of this bill, which has 314 cosponsors, 
enjoying overwhelming bipartisan support.
  The Electronic Communications Privacy Act, or ECPA, was enacted in 
1986.
  The statute is outdated and provides unjustifiably inconsistent 
standards for law enforcement access to stored communications.
  The law was designed at a time when few of us used email or could 
have imagined a world in which we could securely share information and 
edit electronic documents online with others, or where businesses could 
input, store, process, and access all data related to their operation.
  The outdated, inconsistent, and unclear aspects of this statute 
undermine both our privacy interests and law enforcement goals.
  It is critical that we enact the central reforms provided by this 
bill.
  For instance, a probable cause standard should apply to the 
government's ability to compel a communications provider to disclose a 
customer's email message--no matter how old the message is.
  Currently, the statute requires the government to obtain a warrant 
based on probable cause to compel disclosure of an email that is in 
storage for 180 days or less.
  However, the statute only requires a subpoena for the government to 
obtain email messages that are older than 180 days.
  This makes no sense because citizens have the same, reasonable 
expectation that these stored communications are private.
  Therefore, we must change the law so that the higher standard applies 
regardless of the age of these communications, and H.R. 699 would 
accomplish this.
  In addition, the law does not adequately protect communications 
stored ``in the cloud'' by third parties on behalf of consumers, and a 
probable cause warrant should be required for government access.
  ECPA additionally provides a lesser standard for some cloud storage 
than it does for many communications stored by electronic 
communications services.
  To further complicate matters, many companies provide both 
communications services and remote storage, making the services to the 
same customer difficult to separate for purposes of determining which 
standard applies.
  Applying inadequate and unclear standards to government access to 
cloud communications undermines consumer confidence in cloud privacy 
and threatens to hamper the development of this important engine of 
economic growth.
  H.R. 699 addresses this issue by providing a clear and consistent 
probable cause standard for access to the contents of stored 
communications for which customers have a reasonable expectation of 
privacy.
  H.R. 699 would accomplish these fairly straightforward reforms and 
that is why it has the support of privacy advocates and electronic 
communications companies.
  I urge all of my colleagues to support this commonsense, bipartisan 
measure.
  Mr. BABIN. Mr. Speaker, as a proud original cosponsor of H.R. 699, 
the Email Communications Privacy Act (ECPA), I am pleased to rise in 
full support of this bill on the House floor.

[[Page 5212]]

  Since being introduced on February 4, 2015, we have been able to 
secure more than 300 cosponsors of this important bill, which will 
improve privacy protections for the email communications of ordinary 
American citizens.
  Under current law there is little protection for the content of 
electronic communications stored or maintained by third party service 
providers. ECPA corrects this oversight and updates our laws to require 
a court ordered warrant that is based on probable cause before an email 
service provider can disclose these private communications.
  In the current era where individual privacy is often overlooked or 
sidelined, this bill takes an important step to protect your privacy.
  It is long past due that we update our privacy laws to give emails--a 
major means of communication today--the same protection as traditional 
mail and telephone calls. This bill has been endorsed by a broad range 
of privacy groups, including such conservative organizations as the 
Heritage Foundation and FreedomWorks.
  Our bill modernizes these outdated statutes to ensure that the rights 
protected by the Fourth Amendment extend to Americans' email 
correspondence and digital data.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The question is on the motion offered by the 
gentleman from Virginia (Mr. Goodlatte) that the House suspend the 
rules and pass the bill, H.R. 699, as amended.
  The question was taken.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. In the opinion of the Chair, two-thirds 
being in the affirmative, the ayes have it.
  Mr. GOODLATTE. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.
  The yeas and nays were ordered.
  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Pursuant to clause 8 of rule XX, further 
proceedings on this motion will be postponed.

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