In a speech this morning at the Justice Department, the president sketched out his vision of surveillance reforms.
FOR SUBSCRIBERSA harrowing ordeal aboard an Israel-bound plane
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FOR SUBSCRIBERSA harrowing ordeal aboard an Israel-bound plane
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Obama [announced] that a foreign intelligence surveillance court judge will now have to approve queries to the database holding information collected under Section 215 of the Patriot Act. Currently, the agency can acquire telephone communications records in bulk with a court order, but the NSA does not require judicial approval to search the database. The requirement to seek the approval of a judge will go into effect immediately, even without legislation from Congress. […] The president will also say that the NSA should no longer hold the data, but he will stop short of saying that it should not be collected at all. Obama will recommend that the attorney general and intelligence community work together with Congress to decide how the data should be held.
Until now, intelligence analysts have been able to “query” the database so long as they’ve determined a given phone number is subject to “reasonable, articulable suspicion.” Critics have said that gives the NSA too much power to snoop on people. So Obama is going to require that whenever an analyst wants to query the database, they’ll have to get permission from the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court first. The FISA court has not previously been in the position of approving individual requests. Given a certain phone number, the NSA is currently allowed to look at any phone number that is connected to the first, any number that is connected to
“Given the unique power of the state, it is not enough for leaders to say: trust us, we won’t abuse the data we collect. For history has too many examples when that trust has been breached. Our system of government is built on the premise that our liberty cannot depend on the good intentions of those in power; it depends upon the law to constrain those in power. “I make these observations to underscore that the basic values of most Americans when it comes to questions of surveillance and privacy converge far more than the crude characterizations that have emerged over the last several months. Those who are troubled by our existing programs are not interested in a repeat of 9/11, and those who defend these programs are not dismissive of civil liberties. The challenge is getting the details right, and that’s not simple. Indeed, during the course of our review, I have often reminded myself that I would not be where I am today were it not for the courage of dissidents, like Dr. King, who were spied on by their own government; as a President who looks at intelligence every morning, I also can’t help but be reminded that America must be vigilant in the face of threats.”