This Week in Civil Liberties: CISPA, Owlcatraz and Questionable Promotions

Each Friday, we’ll bring you updates on the latest civil liberties news from Maine and the nation. This week, we bring you highlights from the national ACLU Blog of Rights.

What’s Wrong With CISPA
We've written extensively about the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protections Act (CISPA) over the last year, but since the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence is set to mark the bill up next week, and the full House to vote on it the week after that, we're posting in more depth about its shortcomings. Information sharing isn't offensive per se; it's really a question of what can be shared, with whom, and what corporations and government agencies can do with it.

VICTORY! Students Triumph over Private Prison Company’s Bid to Name College Football Stadium
For-profit prison company GEO Group announced its decision last night to withdraw the $6 million donation it made to Florida Atlantic University in exchange for naming rights to the school's football stadium. Student groups, faith groups, the ACLU, and other civil rights groups actively campaigned for the university to dissociate from GEO Group.


CIA to Promote Head of "Black Site" Where Torture Occurred?
According to media reports, the acting director of the CIA's clandestine service has, for the last month, been an official who was "in the chain of command" in the CIA's torture program in the years after 9/11. According to a book by Jose Rodriguez, the former head of the clandestine service, this unnamed official even headed one of the early CIA "black sites"—notorious secret prisons set up overseas to torture detainees. Media reports indicate that the unnamed career officer also reportedly signed off on the destruction of 92 videotapes documenting some of the most brutal mistreatment carried out under the CIA program.