The U.S. Senate allowed a controversial section of the Patriot Act to expire Sunday night.

The provision, entitled Section 215, previously allowed the National Security Agency (NSA) to collect bulk metadata and telephone records through telecommunications companies. Under the vague legislative language, virtually any American’s cell phone records could be mined by the surveillance agencies.

Defenders of 215 said that sunsetting the bill would could create “a serious lapse” in American surveillance, with President Barack Obama even warning that the country could find itself in the “dark” combating internal terrorist activity.

Others are not convinced. Evidence of 215’s ability to thwart terrorism is slim at best. The Electronic Frontier Foundation said a false narrative has been created around the section’s significance.

“Section 215 is only one of a number of largely overlapping surveillance authorities, and the loss of the current version of the law will leave the government with a range of tools that is still incredibly powerful,” EFF reported, citing numerous other government surveillance capacities that allow for data collection — some of which predated the 2005 Patriot Act.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) added that the NSA can still enact administrative and grand jury subpoenas, as well as a laundry list of targeted investigation methods.

Other examples include the Executive Order 12333 and the 2008 FISA Amendments Act, which allow the NSA to collect data indiscriminately on non-citizens in and outside the U.S., as well as “incidental” data mining of U.S. citizens.

“There is no question that, from a privacy perspective, these programs are far more pernicious than what’s been pegged to section 215,” ForeignPolicy.com wrote Monday.

Comedian John Oliver commented that by and large, Americans don’t really care about surveillance policy, especially when happens to non-Americans.

On Last Week Tonight back in April, Oliver humorously explained the dynamic surrounding such Patriot Act provisions.

“There are no easy answers here,” Oliver said. “We all naturally want perfect privacy and perfect safety. But those two things can not coexist. It’s like how you can’t have a bad*** pet falcon and an adorable pet vole named Herbert.”

The U.S. Senate also allowed two other provisions of the Patriot Act to expire as well — “the lone wolf” provision, and the “roving wiretap” provision. These expirations could be temporary.

Monday, some Twitter users also opted for humor on the expiration.