There have been no shortage of headlines surrounding DOGE recently. The organization’s aim to trim the fat from the bureaucracy that is the U.S. federal government has been both heavily scrutinized by those who depend on funding, and highly praised by people who believe the government has become bloated.
What has been concerning to those on both sides of the aisle (one side more so) is the amount of personal information which has been taken in by the unofficial government department. Senators Edward Markey (D-MA) and Ron Wyden (D-OR) introduced the Privacy Act Modernization Act of 2025 on March 31 in an attempt to strengthen the Privacy Act of 1974. The original Privacy Act came about in the aftermath of Watergate and was written 4 years before the creation of even a rudimentary bulletin-board system. In the 51 years since it was enacted into law, one could say things have changed.
Perhaps the most important aspect of the updated law concerns what is called the “routine use” exception for using personal information. Under the old act, as long as personal information was not specially requested and could potentially be targeted to one individual, it could be used by other government organizations. DOGE could theoretically use this section of the act to gather every single piece of personal information for everyone in the U.S. as an argument could be made that they are using it in a routine way. This loophole would be cut down to include “reasonably necessary” and “appropriate”. At first glance, the text does seem to strengthen privacy protections, but the routine use exception “fix” still appears to be relative vague. The real teeth come in the form of increased court authority to delay/deny information with pending lawsuits.
Personal information is still available to members of law enforcement if warranted and there appear to be a lot of updates around information that can be linked to an individual.
While intentional violations of the Privacy Act would become a felony, it would be on the federal level, making it possible for a president to pardon anyone convicted of a crime under the updated act.
The bill appears to be a genuine attempt by members of Congress to curb DOGE from accessing more information than it can reasonably (and safely) handle. The increased authority of the courts would probably have the desired effect of halting the wholesale seizure of personal information by DOGE. What this means is that it has a relatively tough road ahead of it in Congress, though not necessarily an impossible one. Even if it does not pass into law during this Congress, there is a significant chance it could in 2027. Midterm elections are about 19 months away and although a lot of information can be mishandled in those 19 months (understatement), it could be protected going forward.
