The proposed Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA) heads to the Senate this week for a vote. Today, April 22, has been declared a day of protest.

As of this update (4/22/13 1:15 PST), nearly 400 over 500 citizen websites have gone dark for the "CISPA Blackout" as have sites such as Hak5, We Are Legion: The Documentary and What is My IP?. #StopCISPA is trending at #7 on Twitter.

Nearly 165,000 170,000 people have signed the Protect Internet Privacy: Stop CISPA petition. Over 827,000 Almost 833,000 people have signed the global Stop CISPA petition ("Save the Internet from the U.S.").

Effectively, CISPA is a blank check for the U.S. Federal Government to perform search and seizure without a warrant, without individuals ever knowing their data was taken and then, well, passed around.

It has been recently learned that CISPA would allow a large range of Federal agencies - including Immigration, the TSA, Homeland Security, FBI and the DoJ, to quietly access our data from sites ranging from Facebook and Google to Apple, Amazon, and more. CISPA would protect the companies - but not the people.

The cumulative effect of watching this Act rise up after SOPA and PIPA, fail, yet return with blatant disregard for American citizens' rights while the U.S. Government fails to adequately protect the citizen data it already has... Many people feel helpless, angry, and are wondering what they can do - if anything.

CISPA threatens our Fourth Amendment rights — the right against “unreasonable searches and seizures”. #StopCISPA #CISPABlackout — Anonymous (@YourAnonNews) April 20, 2013

Because CISPA is now widely regarded as deeply flawed and reeks of well-publicized corruption, many organizations, websites, companies and individuals are joining in today's protest - initially called and fueled by hacktivist entity Anonymous.

Here's how to add your voice to the protest, with a variety of commitment levels.

One-click email: Enter your zip code on this EFF page for a one-click letter ready to send to your exact Senators - all at once.

On Twitter: add #CISPABlackout or #StopCISPA to tweets. Use the STOP CISPA icon for a day. Tweet a news article about CISPA to raise awareness.

On Facebook: change your icon to the STOP CISPA image, share articles about CISPA, and resource pages for those friends who want to join in.

Sign an easy online petition: At CISPAisback.org, Fight for the Future has a simple petition saying, Tell the U.S. Government: "Violating our privacy is not an option." Enter an email address, click, and you're done.

Sign a big petition: Join the nearly 165,000 people have signed the Protect Internet Privacy: Stop CISPA petition on Change.org.

Even easier calling: PhoneBank.org has put together a very simplified, truly excellent call script on its Stop CISPA and Protect the Internet page, complete with Senator lookup on the page.

Need a blackout page to use tomorrow? anonyops.com/cispablackout/ . Here is the source code: anonyops.com/cispablackout/… #CISPAblackout — Anonymous (@AnonIRC) April 21, 2013