Oregon U.S. Senator Ron Wyden discussed protecting privacy in the digital age at the Club of Eugene, Friday.
As a longtime member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, the Democrat has been critical of government programs collecting large amounts of data on U.S. Citizens. Wyden is concerned the merging of communications systems worldwide will cause innocent Americans to be swept up in searches that target overseas terrorist threats.
Wyden: "I don't think that the government should be allowed to just randomly go through the emails and communications of people through, what I call, "the backdoor search loophole." And I am committed, and I think there will be bipartisan support for this, to closing that backdoor search loophole."
Senator Wyden expressed his opposition to the expansion of the Patriot Act until June 2015, noting he is currently working on legislation to address revisions to it. Wyden praised Senator Wayne Morse's approach to protecting the rights of law abiding citizens.