Court Denies NSA Request To Hold Phone Records Beyond 5 Years

itwbennett writes "As Slashdot readers will remember, last month the U.S. government 'petitioned the court system' to let the NSA retain phone call metadata for more than 5 years, ironically 'because it needs to preserve it as evidence for the various privacy lawsuits filed against the government.' Well, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court has ruled against that request. The FISC's Presiding Judge Reggie B. Walton ruled Friday (PDF) that the proposed amended procedures would further infringe on the privacy interests of U.S. persons whose 'telephone records were acquired in vast numbers and retained by the government for five years to aid in national security investigation.'"

Comments

Obligatory cynicism

[stoploss]

Obligatory cynicism: I believe the only reason this ruling happened is the NSA found a way to technically comply with the ruling while still retaining the data. My guess is they will have a third party store it for them.

Hooray: keep the data, avoid the lawsuits, and keep raping our freedoms! A trifecta for America!

Re:Obligatory cynicism

[Anubis IV]

Want to be cynical? Try this: the act of deleting the data will also delete the evidence that would be used to establish a citizen's grounds for suing the NSA over its illegal data retention. Without the ability to demonstrate that they were affected, no one will have the grounds for a lawsuit.