Obama made the culture more transparent to the NSA.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world...6ef658-0fe5-11e3-85b6-d27422650fd5_story.html
Obama administration had restrictions on NSA reversed in 2011
By Ellen Nakashima, Published: September 7
The Obama administration secretly won permission from a surveillance court in 2011 to reverse restrictions on the National Security Agencyâs use of intercepted phone calls and e-mails, permitting the agency to search deliberately for Americansâ communications in its massive databases, according to interviews with government officials and recently declassified material.
In addition, the court extended the length of time that the NSA is allowed to retain intercepted U.S. communications from five years to six years â and more under special circumstances, according to the documents, which include a recently released 2011 opinion by U.S. District Judge John D. Bates, then chief judge of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.
Declassified 2011 FISA court ruling struck down an NSA program that unlawfully gathered thousands of electronic communications between Americans.
Move allowed agency to search for Americansâ communications.
What had not been previously acknowledged is that the court in 2008 imposed an explicit ban â at the governmentâs request â on those kinds of searches, that officials in 2011 got the court to lift the bar and that the search authority has been used.
Together the permission to search and to keep data longer expanded the NSAâs authority in significant ways without public debate or any specific authority from Congress. The administrationâs assurances rely on legalistic definitions of the term âtargetâ that can be at odds with ordinary English usage. The enlarged authority is part of a fundamental shift in the governmentâs approach to surveillance: collecting first, and protecting Americansâ privacy later.
âThe government says, âWeâre not targeting U.S. persons,â â said Gregory T. Nojeim, senior counsel at the Center for Democracy and Technology. âBut then they never say, âWe turn around and deliberately search for Americansâ records in what we took from the wire.â That, to me, is not so different from targeting Americans at the outset.â
The court decision allowed the NSA âto query the vast majorityâ of its e-mail and phone call databases using the e-mail addresses and phone numbers of Americans and legal residents without a warrant, according to Batesâs opinion.
The queries must be âreasonably likely to yield foreign intelligence information.â And the results are subject to the NSAâs privacy rules.
The court in 2008 imposed a wholesale ban on such searches at the governmentâs request, said Alex Joel, civil liberties protection officer at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI). The government included this restriction âto remain consistent with NSA policies and procedures that NSA applied to other authorized collection activities,â he said.
But in 2011, to more rapidly and effectively identify relevant foreign intelligence communications, âwe did ask the courtâ to lift the ban, ODNI general counsel Robert S. Litt said in an interview. âWe wanted to be able to do it,â he said, referring to the searching of Americansâ communications without a warrant.
Joel gave hypothetical examples of why the authority was needed, such as when the NSA learns of a rapidly developing terrorist plot and suspects that a U.S. person may be a conspirator. Searching for communications to, from or about that person can help assess that personâs involvement and whether he is in touch with terrorists who are surveillance targets, he said. Officials would not say how many searches have been conducted.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world...6ef658-0fe5-11e3-85b6-d27422650fd5_story.html
Obama administration had restrictions on NSA reversed in 2011
By Ellen Nakashima, Published: September 7
The Obama administration secretly won permission from a surveillance court in 2011 to reverse restrictions on the National Security Agencyâs use of intercepted phone calls and e-mails, permitting the agency to search deliberately for Americansâ communications in its massive databases, according to interviews with government officials and recently declassified material.
In addition, the court extended the length of time that the NSA is allowed to retain intercepted U.S. communications from five years to six years â and more under special circumstances, according to the documents, which include a recently released 2011 opinion by U.S. District Judge John D. Bates, then chief judge of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.
Declassified 2011 FISA court ruling struck down an NSA program that unlawfully gathered thousands of electronic communications between Americans.
Move allowed agency to search for Americansâ communications.
What had not been previously acknowledged is that the court in 2008 imposed an explicit ban â at the governmentâs request â on those kinds of searches, that officials in 2011 got the court to lift the bar and that the search authority has been used.
Together the permission to search and to keep data longer expanded the NSAâs authority in significant ways without public debate or any specific authority from Congress. The administrationâs assurances rely on legalistic definitions of the term âtargetâ that can be at odds with ordinary English usage. The enlarged authority is part of a fundamental shift in the governmentâs approach to surveillance: collecting first, and protecting Americansâ privacy later.
âThe government says, âWeâre not targeting U.S. persons,â â said Gregory T. Nojeim, senior counsel at the Center for Democracy and Technology. âBut then they never say, âWe turn around and deliberately search for Americansâ records in what we took from the wire.â That, to me, is not so different from targeting Americans at the outset.â
The court decision allowed the NSA âto query the vast majorityâ of its e-mail and phone call databases using the e-mail addresses and phone numbers of Americans and legal residents without a warrant, according to Batesâs opinion.
The queries must be âreasonably likely to yield foreign intelligence information.â And the results are subject to the NSAâs privacy rules.
The court in 2008 imposed a wholesale ban on such searches at the governmentâs request, said Alex Joel, civil liberties protection officer at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI). The government included this restriction âto remain consistent with NSA policies and procedures that NSA applied to other authorized collection activities,â he said.
But in 2011, to more rapidly and effectively identify relevant foreign intelligence communications, âwe did ask the courtâ to lift the ban, ODNI general counsel Robert S. Litt said in an interview. âWe wanted to be able to do it,â he said, referring to the searching of Americansâ communications without a warrant.
Joel gave hypothetical examples of why the authority was needed, such as when the NSA learns of a rapidly developing terrorist plot and suspects that a U.S. person may be a conspirator. Searching for communications to, from or about that person can help assess that personâs involvement and whether he is in touch with terrorists who are surveillance targets, he said. Officials would not say how many searches have been conducted.
