The New York Times revealed yesterday that for the past four and a half years,
the Bush government has been gathering information on money transfers through
Swift, the international banking clearinghouse.  Quite characteristically, the
government's lawyers determined during implementation of this scheme that the
Right to Financial Privacy Act 1978 does not apply in this circumstance, since
individually identifiable data are being sought not from individuals but from
banks acting on individuals' behalf.  The government maintains that the only
data that are examined are those that are linked to potential terrorists, and
that an independent auditor ensures that Swift records are not used for any
other purposes.  Given this government's expansive definitions of terrorism,
which in the past have included mere political opposition, Congress must not
trust the Bush government with oversight of this scheme.

I urge you, therefore, to support specific, targeted, unambiguous legislation
which would ensure that government access to private financial records, whether
domestic or international, and whether individual or institutional, is used only
in cases of specific and articulable links to individual terrorists or terror
organisations, and not to investigate individuals for political links, or for
any other purposes.