Page 14 - Financial Report 2020

PRIVACY AND CIVIL LIBERTIES OVERSIGHT BOARD

Many of the Commission’s recommendations have been implemented by Congress and
the executive branch, improving the government’s ability to detect and disrupt terrorist
plots. In response to the Commission’s recommendation to create an oversight board,
President George W. Bush created the President’s Board on Safeguarding Americans’
Civil Liberties in 2004. The President’s Board ceased to meet following the enactment
later that year of the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004, which
created the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board within the Executive Office of the
President. Finally, in 2007, the Implementing Recommendations of the 9/11
Commission Act established the Board as an independent agency within the executive
branch.

The Board’s statute makes transparency an inherent part of its mission. Specifically, the
Board is required to inform the public about its work by holding public hearings, issuing
public reports to the extent consistent with the protection of classified information and
applicable law, providing semi-annual reports to the Congress, and appearing and
testifying before Congress upon request.

The Board also has designated roles under Executive Order 13636 (Improving Critical
Infrastructure Cybersecurity), Presidential Policy Directive 28 (regarding the conduct of
signals intelligence activities for foreign intelligence and counterintelligence purposes),
and Section 803 of the Implementing Recommendations of the 9/11 Commission Act of
2007 (“Section 803”).

FY 2020 AGENCY FINANCIAL REPORT 5