NSA Collected Americans' Phone Records Despite Law Change, Says Report (reuters.com)

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: The U.S. National Security Agency collected more than 151 million records of Americans' phone calls last year, even after Congress limited its ability to collect bulk phone records, according to an annual report issued on Tuesday by the top U.S. intelligence officer. The report from the office of Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats was the first measure of the effects of the 2015 USA Freedom Act, which limited the NSA to collecting phone records and contacts of people U.S. and allied intelligence agencies suspect may have ties to terrorism. It found that the NSA collected the 151 million records even though it had warrants from the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance court to spy on only 42 terrorism suspects in 2016, in addition to a handful identified the previous year. The report came as Congress faced a decision on whether to reauthorize Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which permits the NSA to collect foreign intelligence information on non-U.S. persons outside the United States, and is scheduled to expire at the end of this year.

Comments

Like the CIA wasn 't breaking the law before..

[evolutionary]

the CIA has been breaking laws for quite some time. It will take a GIANT public stink before the CIA stops blatantly breaking laws in the name of well...whatever it wants to justify it's behavior with at the time. (Now it's "national security" back in the 50-60's it was "fighting communism"). When Kennedy tried to get the CIA on more government reins...well we know what happened to him.

Re:Can we stop denying the obvious?

[kilfarsnar]

Despite the mounting evidence that the phone surveillance was in full force even last year, most of the news media will still pretend that those 151 million phone records couldn't possibly include Donald Trump or his associates. Obama allowed and expanded the surveillance despite promisingâ during his campaign to abolish it. It should be clearer than ever that Obama was indeed responsible for monitoring the phones of Trump and his associates.

Trump's allegation was that he was specifically wiretapped at the orders of Obama. Not that his conversations were swept up in a dragnet. Not that expect him to actually stand by what he says, because he's Donald Trump and changes positions daily. But the rest of us can at least be clear.

Re:Clapper blatant lies to Congress

[kilfarsnar]

He was in charge. No repercussions. That's all you need to know.

Laws and the consequences for breaking them are for the poor and unconnected.

Shocking, but not at all surprising

[jenningsthecat]

Things like this seriously undermine the credibility of anyone who claims that the US is still a 'nation under the rule of law'.

Start bringing charges against people.

[Gravis Zero]

If there are no repercussions for agencies that break laws then they will just continue breaking them. If you allow agencies to continue breaking laws then your government loses credibility. Governments without credibility are prone to upheaval and a loss of the rule of law.

This, and we know it still happens

[s.petry]

The whole point of the massive NSA datacenter in Utah is that they collect _everything_. The argument from the NSA and Federal Government was that they would only look at data where they had a warrant. Our argument back was that there is no way to ensure data is only viewed by warrant, especially when they were looking at ways of cataloguing data they could see, and trying to crack encryption on what they could not.

We were right, they were dishonest. Nothing new in terms of Government abusing power, and nobody should be surprised that the more we give them the more they abuse.

Since the hardware is already in place to copy all traffic to the NSA, law changes which impact collection of data would have to tackle that particular issue. Good luck with that. ISPs and Telecom providers get paid massive tax dollars to provide the service, so you know that they won't complain.

Re:This, and we know it still happens

[bigpat]

The whole point of the massive NSA datacenter in Utah is that they collect _everything_. The argument from the NSA and Federal Government was that they would only look at data where they had a warrant. Our argument back was that there is no way to ensure data is only viewed by warrant, especially when they were looking at ways of cataloguing data they could see, and trying to crack encryption on what they could not.

We were right, they were dishonest. Nothing new in terms of Government abusing power, and nobody should be surprised that the more we give them the more they abuse.

Since the hardware is already in place to copy all traffic to the NSA, law changes which impact collection of data would have to tackle that particular issue. Good luck with that. ISPs and Telecom providers get paid massive tax dollars to provide the service, so you know that they won't complain.

Well said. I would just add that beyond the practical privacy concerns of people actually snooping on other people for illegitimate purposes there is an important principle of constitutional law that the government is required to have a specific warrant to perform a search. And that making copies of data and in fact scanning that data in the first place to see if it is relevant to a variety of ongoing surveillance activities is itself a search.

It isn't merely the potential for search of the data without warrant after the government has collected it that is the issue. In fact if the data was legally collected and the government has it, then why shouldn't it be available for any legitimate investigation? Any legally collected data should be available to investigators. The problem is that it isn't legally collected data.

If it were just a practical privacy issue then you are already exposed to numerous companies that are collecting, analyzing, storing your communications for a variety of purposes that you might not want to specifically agree to, but might be somehow covered in a customer agreement.

The other big thing that I see as unconstitutional is that the government is effectively not allowing companies the option of an enforceable contract with their customers that it will require a specific warrant to divulge their communications to the government. The big telecoms got that as legal cover, but also to head off competitor companies marketing privacy as something they could legally deliver.

In the US, at least, privacy in your communications against unconstitutionally broad government surveillance isn't an option companies can even offer their customers and business partners because the agreement is made legally unenforceable with no opportunity to seek damages for contract violations against telecom providers under the Patriot Act. I should be allowed to provide customers with a privacy agreement in return for compensation that if I violate it would allow them to seek damages in court.

So the government is unconstitutionally interfering in what should be a lawful privacy contract between telecoms and their customers and business partners.

Thanks Obama!

[Anonymous Coward]

This is what allows Susan Rice to "unmask" US citizens: using the power of the state against its citizenry.

Re:Can we stop denying the obvious?

[Archangel Michael]

It's been going on even before that.

It has been going on for a long time. But here is the thing, Obama made campaign promises to start ripping the system down, and instead, as revealed by several cases, used it to spy on Americans and Journalists. And that makes him actually worse than GWB who did a lot of it. At least we knew what we were getting with GWB, Obama ended up being a backstabbing weasel.

People's morality != Government's

[s.petry]

I have no doubt that some highly moral people join the NSA with the idea that they can be a good guy. Just like most cops join the force to protect and server their community, and most military people join to serve their country and protect our Constitution.

The immorality at the higher levels breaks the delusion,and people either conform to a morality they disagree with to maintain a job or they leave.

All absolutely normal human behavior, well documented, and full of historical references.