Poll: E-Mail Protection Support is Bipartisan

On the eve of a House hearing on communications privacy, the Digital 4th Coalition has released a poll suggesting a vast majority of voters support updating the 1986 Electronic Communications Privacy Act to make it tougher for the government to get access to e-mails.

According to the coalition, whose members include the ACLU and the Center for Democracy and Technology, 77% of respondents said the government should have to get a warrant before accessing e-mails, videos or other online documents.

The agreement on such protections was bipartisan, with 78% of Democrats and 76% of Republicans saying a warrant was needed.

The poll also found that 53% of respondents would be more included to vote for a presidential candidate that supported strengthening online privacy laws.

When ECPA was passed most Americans didn't have e-mail and weren't storing information in the cloud. The law allows the government to access media stored more than 180 days, including social media and private e-mails.

The survey was conducted by phone Nov. 11-12 among 1,011 active voters. The margin of error is plus or minus 3.1%.

Congress has been talking a lot about updating ECPA for the digital age, and in response to leaks from Edward Snowden about bulk collection, but has yet to put a bill on the President's desk.

John Eggerton

Contributing editor John Eggerton has been an editor and/or writer on media regulation, legislation and policy for over four decades, including covering the FCC, FTC, Congress, the major media trade associations, and the federal courts. In addition to Multichannel News and Broadcasting + Cable, his work has appeared in Radio World, TV Technology, TV Fax, This Week in Consumer Electronics, Variety and the Encyclopedia Britannica.