Leahy's new USA Freedom Act — Out this morning: The costs of surveillance — FCC Commissioners talk telecom policy with MMTC | Politico

AND, NEW THIS MORNING: THE COSTS OF NSA SURVEILLANCE---A lengthy new report from New America Foundation's Open Technology Institute crunches the numbers to outline some of the broader impacts of the NSA's surveillance---shifting the focus, at least for a minute, away from the impacts on privacy. Much of the report synthesizes earlier research, from findings on the multi-billion dollar impact of the revelations to cloud computing and web hosting companies to data on the way the Snowden docs changed our trade relations in Europe and elsewhere. "In the name of security, we’re trading away not only privacy, but also the U.S. tech economy, Internet openness, America’s foreign policy interests, and cybersecurity," says Danielle Kehl, a policy analyst at OTI and the primary author of the report. OTI also lays out a series of policy recommendations for addressing the issues it outlines — with a timely emphasis on USA FREEDOM as a good first step toward addressing the issues.