The campaign started yesterday with the airing of a television spot that "graphically illustrates" how Attorney General John Ashcroft's hands are "editing and cutting out portions" of the US constitution and the Bill of Rights.
Before the enactment of the US Patriot Act, police could monitor phone calls after judicial order that allowed the retrieval of dialled numbers but not the contents of communications.
The new law extended these powers to all "wire, oral and electronic communications", allowing the police to identify a suspect's e-mail correspondents. Police can also obtain a list of web sites visited by a suspect.
The ACLU claims that the extension of police interception powers to the internet was "a terrible mistake" because URLs "give far more content than a string of telephone numbers."
Attorney General John Ashcroft said that he "welcomes the debate."
More information about the ACLU campaign is available from:
www.aclu.org
The US Patriot Act 2001 can be found at:
www.epic.org/privacy/terrorism/hr3162.html