White House To Propose Ending NSA Phone Records Collection

The New York Times reported last night that the White House is planning to introduce a legislative package that would mostly end the NSA's bulk collection of phone records. Instead, phone companies would be required to hand over records up to "two hops" from a target number. Phone companies would be required to retain records for 18 months (already legally mandated) instead of the NSA storing records for five years. It does not appear that secret courts and secret orders from the court would be abolished, however. From the article: "The new type of surveillance court orders envisioned by the administration would require phone companies to swiftly provide records in a technologically compatible data format, including making available, on a continuing basis, data about any new calls placed or received after the order is received, the officials said ... The administration’s proposal would also include a provision clarifying whether Section 215 of the Patriot Act, due to expire next year unless Congress reauthorizes it, may in the future be legitimately interpreted as allowing bulk data collection of telephone data. ... The proposal would not, however, affect other forms of bulk collection under the same provision."

Comments

Sure

[Stumbles]

This "call" no doubt falls into the same category of the Patriot Act Obama railed against as a Senator but has since expanded.

Re:Sure

[MachineShedFred]

Or, more appropriately, the NSA is part of the executive branch.

Obama is the Chief Executive.

If he really wanted to stop this shit, he could issue an executive order stopping this shit. Congress never passed a law requiring the NSA to collect this data; Obama could stop this shit RIGHT NOW if he wanted to.

But he doesn't want to. He wants to pass the buck, and blame a gridlocked Congress when the House does what the House does - shitcan any proposed legislation coming from this White House.

This is just a cheap and cynical play to score some points before a midterm election. Obama has exactly zero intentions of actually shutting this down.

They aren't ending anything

[sjbe]

The New York Times reported last night that the White House is planning to introduce a legislative package that would mostly end the NSA's bulk collection of phone records.

They have no intention of ending it, they just are forcing others to do it for them. Basically instead of you and I paying for the NSA to spy on us with tax dollars were going to pay the NSA to spy on us with our phone bills instead. Just because they privatize the burden of data collection doesn't mean they are ending anything.

Instead, phone companies would be required to hand over records up to "two hops" from a target number.

What this means in practice is that if you and I both call FedEx that is considered a "hop" and now our numbers are linked. They essentially can use any commonly called number to get to anyone else and you can cover a HUGE percentage of the population with a few common phone numbers. This is a "limitation" that really isn't a limitation.

Snowden

[Major Blud]

This begs the quesion......if Snowden hadn't released this info, would this "change" be taking place? I wish I could say that this was an admission from the White House that what he did was right, but we know that's not the truth.