ACLU: NSA Retains Purely Domestic Communications Without Warrants, Documents Show

[ProSense]

5. The ACLU

"After Congress enacted the FISA Amendments Act in 2008, we worried that the NSA would use the new authority to conduct warrantless surveillance of Americans' telephone calls and emails. These documents confirm many of our worst fears. The 'targeting' procedures indicate that the NSA is engaged in broad surveillance of Americans' international communications.

...is quoting Greenwald, but he does a lot of speculating while reporting the procedures. The "international communications" are why there are safeguards. There is more to the report on the actual procedures.

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The authors write that the documents "detail the circumstances in which data collected on U.S. persons under the foreign intelligence authority must be destroyed, extensive steps analysts must take to try to check targets are outside the U.S., and reveals how U.S. call records are used to help remove U.S. citizens and residents from data collection."

"The broad scope of the court orders, and the nature of the procedures set out in the documents, appear to clash with assurances from President Obama and senior intelligence officials that the NSA could not access Americans' call or e-mail information without warrants," Greenwald and Ball write.

The procedures governing collection of information on foreign targets "cover only part of the NSA's surveillance of domestic U.S. communications," the Guardian says. It reported earlier this month that most data collection happens with approval of the FISA court under the Patriot Act.

The FISA court allows the NSA to keep data "that could potentially contain details of U.S. persons" for up to five years, and to retain and use "inadvertently acquired" domestic communications that contain "usable intelligence, information on criminal activity, threat of harm to people or property, are encrypted, or are believed to contain any information relevant to cybersecurity," the Guardian writes.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/06/20/nsa-surveillance-fisa-court/2442899/