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NPR
A federal judge in Washington says the National Security Agency's program for bulk phone record collection violates Americans' reasonable expectation of privacy.The ruling (pdf), however, has been stayed pending a likely appeal.
Judge Richard Leon says the sweeping NSA collection of U.S. phone metadata constitutes an unreasonable search or seizure under the Fourth Amendment.
The judge says the Smith v. Maryland Supreme Court ruling the Obama administration has used to underpin that program involved only a short period of collection, not the years-long approach the NSA has been taking based on advances in technology.
In sometimes blistering language, Leon, who was appointed by President George W. Bush, says times have changed since 1979, when Maryland was decided. Leon says advances in technology and people's use of cell phones mean that old case no longer holds.
In the Maryland case, the Supreme Court found that dialing a number was akin to calling an operator and asking to be connected to someone. When you hand that information to a third party, the court found, a person loses their expectation of privacy. Police, therefore, did not need a warrant to obtain "pen register" data from phone companies. The Obama administration has argued that the metadata — things like number dialed, time and duration of call — it collects in bulk is likewise exempted from Fourth Amendment protection.
NPR
Looks like Edward Snowden won't get amnesty after all."Mr. Snowden is accused of leaking classified information and faces felony charges here in the United States," Caitlin Hayden, a spokeswoman for the National Security Council, said, according to USA Today. "He should be returned to the U.S. as soon as possible, where he will be accorded full due process and protections."
Snowden is the former contractor for the National Security Agency who leaked classified information on the scale and scope of the agency's surveillance activities. Speculation that he would get amnesty if he returns the documents were sparked Sunday by comments from Rick Ledgett, the man in charge of the Snowden task force at the NSA. He told CBS' 60 Minutes:
The Guardian
The National Security Agency is telling its story like never before. Never mind whether that story is, well, true.On Sunday night, CBS’s 60 Minutes ran a remarkable piece that provided NSA officials, from director Keith Alexander to junior analysts, with a long, televised forum to push back against criticism of the powerful spy agency. It’s an opening salvo in an unprecedented push from the agency to win public confidence at a time when both White House reviews and pending legislation would restrict the NSA’s powers.
But mixed in among the dramatic footage of Alexander receiving threat briefings and junior analysts solving Rubik’s cubes in 90 seconds were a number of dubious claims: from the extent of surveillance to collecting on Google and Yahoo data centers to an online “kill-switch” for the global financial system developed by China.
Reporter John Miller, a former official with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and an ex-FBI spokesman, allowed these claims to go unchallenged. The Guardian, not so much. Here’s our take:
BBC
A US judge has ruled the National Security Agency's mass collection of telephone data unconstitutional.Federal District Judge Richard Leon said the electronic spy agency's practice was an "arbitrary invasion".
The agency's collection of "metadata" including telephone numbers and times and dates of calls was brought to light by ex-NSA contractor Edward Snowden.
The White House dismissed the suggestion Mr Snowden receive amnesty if he stopped leaking documents.
In his ruling in a Washington DC federal court on Monday, Mr Leon called the NSA's surveillance program "indiscriminate" and an "almost Orwellian technology that enables the government to store and analyze the phone metadata of every telephone user in the United States".
USA Today
WASHINGTON — A federal judge ruled Monday that the National Security Agency's controversial surveillance program that collects millions of Americans' telephone records may be unconstitutional.U.S. District Court Judge Richard Leon ruled in a lawsuit brought by conservative activist Larry Klayman that the legal challenge to the massive surveillance program -- disclosed in full earlier this year by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden — would likely succeed.
Leon, appointed to the bench by President George W. Bush, issued a preliminary injunction against the program but suspended the order to allow an appeal by the Justice Department, which said it was reviewing the decision.