Washington, D.C.—Senator Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, a member and former Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee and the current Chairman of the Senate Republican High-Tech Task Force, issued the following statement after the Senate passed the Judicial Redress Act, which he sponsored. 

“I am pleased the full Senate has passed this legislation, which demonstrates that the United States respects cross-border data privacy,” Hatch said. “It will complete an important agreement with the EU and thereby improve the ability of law enforcement to fight crime and terrorism.”

Background

The Judicial Redress Act extends core benefits of the Privacy Act to select U.S. allies with regard to information shared with the U.S. for law enforcement purposes, including judicial redress for denials of access to and correction of records and remedies for intentional or willful disclosure of information. On February 1st, the Judiciary Committee reported the bill by a vote of 19-1.

The Judicial Redress Act was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives by Congressmen James Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) and John Conyers (D-Mich.). Before passing the Senate, the bill passed the House by voice vote on October 20, 2015.  It is supported by the White House, the U.S. Department of Justice, and U.S. federal law enforcement agencies. The legislation has also garnered numerous endorsements from organizations outside of government, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the Application Developers Alliance, the Software Alliance, the Computer & Communications Industry Association, the Information Technology Industry Council, the Internet Association, the Software & Information Industry Association, the Trans Atlantic Business Council, IBM, Facebook, Foursquare, Google, Intuit, Microsoft, and Yahoo.