The House Committee on Department of Homeland Security's Subcommittee on Intelligence, Information Sharing, and Terrorism Risk Assessment held a hearing September 27, 2007, at 10:00 a.m., 311 Cannon House Office Building on the topic of “The Way Forward With Fusion Centers: Challenges and Strategies for Change.”

House Committee on the Judiciary held a hearing on September 18, 2007 on Warrantless Surveillance and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act: The Role of Checks and Balances in Protecting Americans’ Privacy Rights (Part II)

The House Committee on the Judiciary held a hearing September 5, 2007 on Warrantless Surveillance and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act: The Role of Checks and Balances in Protecting Americans’ Privacy Rights.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers, Jr. (D-MI), along with Subcommittee Chairmen Jerrold Nadler and Robert "Bobby" C. Scott, sent a letter to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, following weekend reports that disputes over the NSA's terrorist surveillance program involved "massive electronic databases." The full text of the letter is attached below.

On November 1 and 2, 2007, the Federal Trade Commission will host a Town Hall entitled “http://www.ftc.gov/opa/2007/08/ehavioral.shtm" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">Ehavioral Advertising: Tracking, Targeting, and Technology.” The event will bring together consumer advocates, industry representatives, technology experts, and academics to address consumer protection issues raised by the practice of tracking consumers’ activities online to target advertising - or “behavioral advertising.” The Town Hall is a follow-on to a dialogue on behavioral advertising that emerged at a November 2006 FTC forum, “Tech-Ade,” which examined the key technological and business developments that will shape consumers’ core experiences in the coming ten years. In addition, several consumer privacy advocates, as well as the State of New York, recently sent letters to the FTC asking it to examine the effects of behavioral advertising on consumer privacy.

WASHINGTON – A subcommittee of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee held a hearing today on secure identification technology, and the American Civil Liberties Union urged lawmakers to consider the privacy implications before rushing to embrace new technology. Since 9/11, some Members of Congress have proposed the government mandate identity documents for everyone, including citizens. Congress has passed sound-good legislation without fully considering their impact on Americans’ privacy. The government’s troubled, still behind-schedule Real ID program, which 17 states have rejected, and the notoriously delayed Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative, are only two examples of the government’s problems getting identity security off the ground.