Why It's Important to Call Your Representative About CFAA Reform and Aaron's Law

This week, EFF and a bipartisan coalition of organizations are calling for a Week of Action to reform the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act—the law used in the aggressive prosecution of Aaron Swartz and that could potentially be used to turn every Internet user into a criminal.

Since Aaron's death, EFF has proposed changes that would reform the CFAA and bring it into the 21st Century. Unfortunately, the House Justiciary committee has proposed radical changes to the CFAA that would seek to increase penalties, expand the law, and criminalize new actions.

This week, we have a Twitter tool which you can use to express your support for reform and an action center which allows you to easily find your representative and email them. But if you live in one of the following districts, you can have even more impact by calling your representative on the phone.

We've heard from multiple sources in Congress that the most effective action taken during the SOPA protest in January 2012 was the massive numbers of people who called into Congress to express their concern. During that week of action, the phone lines in Congress were temporarily overwhelmed from call volume and had to be shut down. This sent a powerful message to those who were considering voting against Internet freedom.

Here are some talking points for you to mention during the phone call:

Hello, my name is [YOUR NAME] and I am a constituent of the Representative.

I think the recent proposed changes by the House Judiciary committee to the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act are a bad idea, and I hope the representative will stand against them.

The Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) has vague language that broadly criminalizes accessing a computer without "authorization," but doesn't explain what that actually means. It contains heavy-handed penalties and shows no regard for whether an act was done to further the public good. And the Justice Department thinks it criminalizes terms of use violations, meaning it would be criminal for me to use a nickname on Faceook. It's time to reform the CFAA. I want my representative to make sure that there are:

1. No more criminal penalties for violating a website's fine print
2. No criminal penalties for circumvention techniques that protect privacy and promote security and
3. Penalties proportionate to offenses

Thank you for your consideration.

Find your state in the list below to get the phone numbers for your Representative.

Help us spread the word!

Once you’ve called your Representative, there are still more steps you can take to fight the House Judiciary Committee changes. Tell your friends, in person or on Twitter, and ask them to call their representative. And if you haven’t yet used our action alert, act now to e-mail your legislators.

State-District Representative Phone Number Alabama-6 Spencer Bachus (202) 225-4921 Arizona-8 Trent Franks (202) 225-4576 California-37 Karen Bass (202) 225-7084 California-27 Judy Chu (202) 225-5464 California-49 Darrell Issa (202) 225-3906 California-19 Zoe Lofgren (202) 225-3072 Florida-26 Joe Garcia (202) 225-2778 Florida-6 Ron DeSantis (202) 225-2706 Florida-21 Ted Deutch (202) 225-3001 Georgia-9 Doug Collins (202) 225-9893 Georgia-4 Hank Johnson (202) 225-1605 Iowa-4 Steve King (202) 225-4426 Idaho-1 Raul Labrador (202) 225-6611 Illinois-4 Luis Gutierrez (202) 225-8203 Louisiana-2 Cedric Richmond (202) 225-6636 Michigan-13 John Conyers (202) 225-5126 Nevada-2 Mark Amodei (202) 225-6155 North Carolina-6 Howard Coble (202) 225-3065 North Carolina-13 George Holding (202) 225-3032 North Carolina-12 Mel Watt (202) 225-1510 New York-10