The USA Patriot Act Section 215, also known as the "library provision", significantly expanded surveillance powers for fighting terrorism. It allows the FBI to obtain records from libraries and bookstores without probable cause. While its use on libraries is unclear, it concerns librarians and civil liberties groups. Options include eliminating it, amending it with stronger protections for privacy and due process, or maintaining the status quo.

1. USA Patriot Act
Section 215
“The Library
Provision”
Dorotea Szkolar
Syracuse University
IST 618, Issue Brief Presentation

2. Introduction
• Significantly expanded law enforcements
surveillance and investigative powers to
fight terrorism.
• Section 215, is commonly referred to as
the “library provision”
• Impact, Concerns and Obligations for
Academic Libraries under the law,
especially related to digital materials?

3. USA Patriot Act- Section Highlights
• “Section. 501. (a)(1) The Director of the Federal Bureau of
Investigation or a designee of the Director may make an
application for an order requiring the production of any
tangible things (including books, records, papers, documents
and other items) for an investigation to protect against
international terrorism or clandestine intelligence
activities, provided that such investigation of a United States
Person is not conducted solely upon the basis of activities
protected by the first amendment to the constitution.”

4. USA Patriot Act- Section
Highlights
• “(b) Each application under this
section shall be made to a judge of
the court established by section
103(a) or a United States Magistrate
Judge under chapter 43 of title 28,
United States Code”

5. USA Patriot Act- Section
Highlights
(2)(d) “No person shall disclose to any other
person (other than those person necessary
to produce the tangible things under this
section) that the Federal Bureau of
Investigation has sought or obtained
tangible things under this section.”

6. USA Patriot Act- Section
Highlights
Sec. 502. Congressional Oversight
“(b) on a semiannual basis, the Attorney General shall provide to
the Committees on the judiciary of the House of Representatives
and the Senate a report setting for with respect to the
proceeding 6-month period-(1) the total number of applications
made for orders approving requests for the production of
tangible things under section 402 and (2) the total number of
such orders either granted, modified or denied”

7. CRS Report For Congress, July 6,
2005
• “The USA Patriot Act enacted to help track down and punish
terrorists and to prevent further terrorism, contains no
provisions specifically directed at libraries or their patrons. It
has several provisions, however, that, might apply in a library
context.”

8. Brief History of Act
• Intelligence Reauthorization Act of
2004
• USA Patriot Improvement and
Reauthorization Act of 2005
• In 2011, President Obama approved a
four-year extension of expiring
provisions of the Patriot Act- narrowly
avoid a lapse in the terrorist
surveillance law.
• The USA Patriot Act has been in
existence for over a decade and
continuous to be passed. While
suggestions have been made for
amendments or provisions to restrict
section 215, these have not passed.

9. Key Stakeholders
• Academic Research Libraries: Academic
librarians and Library Administrators
• Researchers, Professors, and Students
• University Administration
• Civil Liberty Organizations
• Intellectual Discussion and Intellectual
Research is Cornerstone of Democracy
• Privacy Rights and Civil Liberties of Users;
Gag Orders preventing opposition or
defense against false accusation

10. Key Stakeholders
• Anti-Terrorism Agencies- FBI, Homeland Security, Etc.
• Executive Branch
• Congress
• General American Public- Debate reflect tension between
balancing first and fourth amendments rights and the need for
national security.

11. Policy Options
• Eliminate Section 215
• But what about security concerns?
• Reported cases of terrorists utilizing libraries before attacks.
• Leave Section 215 and Maintain Status Quo
• Does not address concerns of key stakeholders.

12. Policy Options
• Amend/Reform Section 215 with exceptions for special cases
for libraries.
• American Association of Law Libraries “If repeal of section 215 is
not possible, we urge Congress to include in the reauthorization
of the bill requirements that return to the pre-PATRIOT Act
Standard. Documents or other tangible things being sought by
the FBI or a designee must be shown to pertain to a suspected
agent of a foreign power or a person in contact with or otherwise
directly linked to such agent”

13. Policy Options
ALA continues to seek reforms that would
1. Require law enforcement officials to show individualized suspicion that records or
other items being sought pertain to a foreign power or agent, a person in contact
with a suspected agent, or a suspected agent who is the subject of the investigation;
and
2. Require records other items being sought to be described with sufficient particularity
to allow them to be identified – reducing the danger that the FBI will engage in fishing
expeditions into personally identifiable information in library or bookstore records;
and
3. Required the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) Court to make a finding that
these facts have been sufficiently demonstrated; and
4. Show cause for a FISA court to approve a gag order; gage orders will expire at the
end of six months unless cause is shown to reauthorize them; and
5. Allow a recipient of a FISA Section 215 records-search order to consult with an
attorney or others for help responding to the request; and
6. Guarantee a recipient the right to challenge any gag order; and
7. Ensure due process for any recipient challenging a search or gag order; and
8. Set a sunset date for Section 215 of no more than four years, to ensure ongoing
oversight and assessment of the impact of this provision on civil liberties; and
9. Intensify oversight of the Section 215 and national security letters provisions of the
USA PATRIOT Act and other laws that limit the privacy rights of library users, library
employees and the general public.

14. CRS Report For Congress, July 6,
2005
“Although past practices have apparently made the
library community apprehensive, the extent to which the
authority of section 215 has been used, if at all, is
unclear. Media accounts of federal investigations
involving library patrons ordinary do not distinguish
between simple inquires, grand jury subpoenas, criminal
search warrants, FISA physical search orders ,and FISA
tangible item orders. Moreover, the justice department
has indicated that as of March 30, 2005, the authority
under section 215 has been exercise on 35
occasions, but had not been used in any instance to
secure library , bookstore, gun or medical records”

15. Sources
1. H.R.3162, USA Patriot Act (107th Congress, 2001)
2. Doyle, C. (2005). Libraries and the USA Patriot Act . D.C.: Congressional
Research Service .
3. Libraries, A. A. (2009). USA Patriot Act Reauthorization of Section 215 .
Retrieved 2012, from American Association of Law Libraries .
4. Mascaro, L. (2011, May 27). Patriot Act provisions extended just in time.
Retrieved 11 11, 2012, from L.A. Times :
http://articles.latimes.com/2011/may/27/nation/la-na-patriot-act-20110527
5. Reid, M. (2009, December). The USA Patriot Act and Academic Libraries, An
Overview . C&RL News, pp. 646-650.
6. The USA Patriot Act . (n.d.). Retrieved from American Library Assocation :
http://www.ala.org/advocacy/advleg/federallegislation/theusapatriotact
7. Taking Issue-The Patriot Act: Section 215. (2005, July 21). Retrieved from NPR:
http://www.npr.org/takingissue/20050721_takingissue_patriotact.html
8. Belt, D. (2006, March 27). The USA Patriot Act . Retrieved from PBS:
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/indepth_coverage/terrorism/homeland/patriot
act.html