CISPA?

Before I start with this I think it's important to understand the very recent history of these bills and laws or whatever you want to call them, seeing as CISPA is only the most recent (one up until this post.)

• SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) October 26, 2011
  This was a bill imposed by the United States by U.S. Representative Lamar S. Smith (R-TX). It's goal was focussed more towards online piracy, as stated in the name of the bill. It was supposed to put more restrictions on online copyrighted material.
• PIPA (PROTECT IP Act, or Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act)
  May 12, 2011
  Also imposed within the United States, the bill was introduced on May 12, 2011, by Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT). It's purpose was to give copyright holders access to more tools to assist them in keeping their materials (and who can access them) within their control. It ended up being passed but was actually put on hold by Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR).
• ACTA (Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement) November 15, 2010
  This is a multinational treaty for the purpose of establishing international standards for intellectual property rights enforcement. The agreement aims to establish an international legal framework for targeting counterfeit goods, generic medicines and copyright infringement on the Internet. In October of 2011, the agreement was signed by by Australia, Canada, Japan, Morocco, New Zealand, Singapore, South Korea, and of course, the United States. In January 2012, the European Union (including 22 countries of which are apart of the EU) also signed, therefore bringing the number of signatories up to 31. Only 6 of the signatories need to agree on, or I guess "ratify," the agreement in order for it to come into effect, but I believe none of them have done anything yet. As far as I know, it's just sitting still. I put this one as the last because it was actually the last to be brought to my attention.
  

What these three bills have in common, are the infringements on our right and freedoms as human beings. After 9/11 (which I most definitely believe has a little more to it than what the Government left it at) the right and freedoms began to slowly fade away and didn't seem do seem as strong as before. Apparently, the internet is next. I don't know about you, but I hate that feeling that you get when someone is watching over your shoulder... Now, I'd like to point out that the reasons for which these bills were being imposed aren't that bad, but the solutions aren't in our favour. Before we continue on to what exactly this post is about, I'd like to leave it at this. Google, Mozilla, Wikimedia Foundation, Reddit, and in total around 115,000 websites protested against SOPA/PIPA and or ACTA by either closing their websites completely, partly, or by displaying information about why exactly you shouldn't support these bills as well as encouraging those reading to do more research for themselves. People such as Sir Tim Berners-Lee, the inventor of the World Wide Web, as well as a letter written to congress by many of the inventors of the internet - and by many, I think it was something like 81? Any ways, you get the point. SOPA and PIPA were eventually shelved... Moving on!

• CISPA (Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act) November 30, 2011
  The most recent bill is apparently just the SOPA, but renamed, well - and completely re-done. This is what I've heard and read by some news source which currently escape my mind. I don't know about the literal accuracy of that but, at the very least, what I can tell you with certainty is that this bill is the SOPA's big brother and that it was brought to attention to the House on November 30, 2011 by U.S. Representative Michael Rogers (R-MI). It's actually an amendment to the National Security Act of 1947, which does not currently contain provisions pertaining to cybercrime. The bottom line about this bill is that it contains very few limits as to how the government can monitor private information.

These bills are an attack on the internet, how do you feel about every little thing you do being monitored on the internet? For the record, Canada (which is where I live - so I'll mention this) did have a part of bill C-10 (Safe Streets and Communities Act) which specifically had to do with monitoring the internet, but was taken out due to protest before the bill was passed on March 12th (a month ago).