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04 Sep 12
lizz garrett"NSA has massive database of Americans' phone calls"
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The agency's goal is "to create a database of every call ever made" within the nation's borders
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01 Aug 12
Alexander SemenovЗаметка о том, как правительство США использует базу звонков для SNA
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25 Jun 12
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The National Security Agency has been secretly collecting the phone call records of tens of millions of Americans, using data
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provided by AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth, people with direct knowledge of the arrangement told USA TODAY.
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he NSA program reaches into homes and businesses across the nation by amassing information about the calls of
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most of whom aren't suspected of an
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ordinary Americans
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crime
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This program does not involve the NSA listening to or recording conversations. But the spy agency is using the data to analyze calling patterns in an effort to detect terrorist activity
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sources said in separate interviews
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"It's the largest database ever assembled in the world," said
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one person, who, like the others who agreed to talk about the
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NSA's activities, declined to be identified by name or affiliatio
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he agency's goal is "to create a database of every call eve
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made" within the nation's borders
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or the customers of these companies, it means that th
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overnment has detailed records of calls they made — across town or across the country — to family members, co-workers, business contacts and others.
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he three telecommunications companies are working under contract with the NSA, which launched the program in 2001
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shortly after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks
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The sources would talk only under a guarantee of anonymity because the NSA program is secret.
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Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden, nominated Monday by President Bush to become the director of the CIA, headed the
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NSA from March 1999 to April 2005. In that post, Hayden would have overseen the agency's domestic call-tracking program. Hayden declined to comment about the program.
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is far more expansive than what the White House has
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Bush said he had authorized the
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acknowledged
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NSA to eavesdrop — without warrants — on international calls and international e-mails of people suspected of having links
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to terrorists when one party to the communication is in the
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USA. Warrants have also not been used in the NSA's efforts to create a national call database.
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, Bush insisted that the NSA was focused exclusively on international calls. "In other words," Bush explained, "one end of the communication must be outside the United States."
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those of calls that originate and terminate within U.S. borders — were believed to be private.
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Sources, however, say that is not the case. With access to
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records of billions of domestic calls, the NSA has gained a
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ecret window into the communications habits of millions of Americans. Customers' names, street addresses and other personal information are not being handed over as part of NSA's domestic program, the sources said. But the phone numbers the NSA collects can easily be cross-checked with other databases to obtain that information.
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he White House would not discuss the domestic call-tracking
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There is no domestic surveillance without court approval," said Dana Perino, deputy press secretary, referring to actual eavesdropping.
She added that all national intelligence activities undertaken by the federal government "are lawful, necessary and required for the pursuit of al-Qaeda and affiliated terrorists." All
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program.
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government-sponsored intelligence activities "are carefully reviewed and monitored," Perino said. She also noted that "all appropriate members of Congress have been briefed on the
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ntelligence efforts of the United States
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he government is collecting "external" data on domestic phone calls but is not intercepting "internals," a term for the
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ctual content of the communication, according to a U.S.
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ntelligence official familiar with the program
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This kind of data collection from phone companies is not uncommon; it's been done before, though never on this large a scale, the official said. The data are used for "social network analysis," the official said, meaning to study how terrorist networks contact
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each other and how they are tied togethe
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Among the big telecommunications companies, only Qwest
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has refused to help the NSA, the sources said. According to multiple sources, Qwest declined to participate because it was
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uneasy about the legal implications of handing over customer information to the government without warrants
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Created by President Truman in 1952, during the Korean Wa
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he NSA is charged with protecting the United States from
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he agency was considered so secret that for years the government refused to even confirm its
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foreign security threats
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xistence. Government insiders used to joke that NSA stood for "No Such Agency."
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In 1975, a congressional investigation revealed that the NSA had been intercepting, without warrants, international
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communications for more than 20 years at the behest of the
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he spy campaign, code-named
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CIA and other agencie
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Shamrock," led to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which was designed to protect Americans from ille
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eavesdroppin
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Paul Butler, a former U.S. prosecutor who specialized in
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errorism crimes, said FISA approval generally isn't necessary for government data-mining operations. "FISA does not prohibi
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he government from doing data minin
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he usefulness of the NSA's domestic phone-call database a
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counterterrorism tool is unclear. Also unclear is whether the
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atabase has been used for other purposes
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The NSA's domestic program raises legal questions. Historically, AT&T and the regional phone companies have required law enforcement agencies to present a court order before they would even consider turning over a customer's calling data. Part of that owed to the personality of the old Bell Telephone System, out of which those companies grew.
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Ma Bell's bedrock principle — protection of the customer
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guided the company for decades, said Gene Kimmelman, senior public policy director of Consumers Union. "No court order, no customer information — period. That's how it was for decades," he said.
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The concern for the customer was also based on law: Under Section 222 of the Communications Act, first passed in 1934, telephone companies are prohibited from giving out information regarding their customer
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The NSA's domestic program began soon after the Sept. 11 attacks, according to the sources. Right around that time, they said, NSA representatives approached the nation's biggest telecommunications companies. The agency made an urgent pitch: National security is at risk, and we need your help to protect the country from
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attacks
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The agency told the companies that it wanted them to turn over their "call-detail records," a complete listing of
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n addition, the NSA wanted the carriers to provide updates
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the calling histories of their millions of customers
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he sources said the NSA made clear that it was willing to pay for the cooperation.
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SBC, headed by Ed Whitacre; and Verizon, headed by Ivan Seidenberg
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AT&T, when asked about the program, replied with a comment prepared for USA TODAY: "We do not comment
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on matters of national security, except to say that we only assist law enforcement and government agencies
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charged with protecting national security in strict accordance with the law
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n another prepared comment, BellSouth said: "BellSouth does not provide any confidential customer information to the NSA or any governmental agency without proper legal authority."
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Verizon, the USA's No. 2 telecommunications company behind AT&T, gave this statement: "We do not comment on national security matters, we act in full compliance with the law and we are committed to safeguarding our customers' privacy."
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Qwest spokesman Robert Charlton said: "We can't talk about this. It's a classified situation.
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In December, The New York Times revealed that Bush had authorized the NSA to wiretap
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without warrants,
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nternational phone calls and e-mails that travel to or from the USA. The following month, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, a civil liberties group, filed a class-action lawsuit against AT&T. The lawsuit accuses the compan
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of helping the NSA spy on U.S. phone customers
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Last month, U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales alluded to that possibility. Appearing at a House Judiciary Committee hearing, Gonzales was asked whether he thought the White House has the legal authority to monitor domestic traffic without a warrant. Gonzales' reply: "I wouldn't rule it out." His comment marked the first time a Bush appointee publicly asserted that the White House might have that authority.
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The domestic and international call-tracking programs have things in common, according to the sources. Both
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he Bush administration has
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are being conducted without warrants and without the approval of the FISA court
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Officials, including Gonzales, also make the case that the USA Patriot Act gives them broad authority to protect the safety of the nation's citizens.
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argued that FISA's procedures are too slow in some cases.
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Qwest's CEO at the time, Joe Nacchio, was deeply troubled by the
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NSA's assertion that Qwest didn't need a court order — or approval under FISA — to proceed
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Adding to the
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tension, Qwest was unclear about who, exactly, would have access to its customers' information and how tha
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information might be used
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Financial implications were also a concern, the sources said. Carriers that illegally divulge calling information
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he NSA was asking Qwest to turn over millions of records. The fines, in the aggregate, could have been substantial.
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can be subjected to heavy fines
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The NSA told Qwest that other government agencies, including the FBI, CIA and DEA, also might have access
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the database, the sources said.
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As a matter of practice, the NSA regularly shares its information — known as
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"product" in intelligence circles — with other intelligence groups.
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The NSA, which needed Qwest's participation to completely cover the country, pushed back har
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Trying to put pressure on Qwest, NSA representatives pointedly told Qwest that it was the lone holdout among the big telecommunications companies. It also tried appealing to Qwest's patriotic side: In one meeting, an NSA representative suggested that Qwest's refusal to contribute to the database could compromise national security, one person recalled.
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n addition, the agency suggested that Qwest's foot-dragging might affect its ability to get future classified work with the government. Like other big telecommunications companies, Qwest already had classified contracts and hoped to get more
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Unable to get comfortable with what NSA was proposing, Qwest's lawyers asked NSA to take its proposal to the FISA court. According to the sources, the agency refuse
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he NSA's explanation did little to satisfy Qwest's lawyers. "They told (Qwest) they didn't want to do that becaus
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FISA might not agree with them," one person recalled. For similar reasons, this person said, NSA rejected Qwest's suggestion of getting a letter of authorization from the U.S. attorney general's office. A second person
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confirmed this version of events
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27 Mar 12
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06 Oct 11
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30 Aug 11
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27 Jan 11
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03 Jan 11
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27 Oct 09
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National Security Agency
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The NSA program reaches into homes and businesses across the nation by amassing information about the calls of ordinary Americans
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For the customers of these companies, it means that the government has detailed records of calls they made
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Michael Hayden
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01 Nov 08
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17 Oct 07
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14 Jun 06
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17 May 06
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15 May 06
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13 May 06
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The National Security Agency has been secretly collecting the phone call records of tens of millions of Americans, using data provided by AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth, people with direct knowledge of the arrangement told USA TODAY. The NSA program reaches into homes and businesses across the nation by amassing information about the calls of ordinary Americans — most of whom aren't suspected of any crime. This program does not involve the NSA listening to or recording conversations. But the spy agency is using the data to analyze calling patterns in an effort to detect terrorist activity, sources said in separate interviews.
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11 May 06
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webminkOf course, only wrongdoers need be concerned.
Privacy rights USA telephone surveillance constitution NSA Database abuse
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Bill W.Let's see...84...94...04...hmmmm.
Twenty-two years late.-
The National Security Agency has been secretly collecting the phone call records of tens of millions of Americans, using data provided by AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth, people with direct knowledge of the arrangement told USA TODAY.
The NSA program reaches into homes and businesses across the nation by amassing information about the calls of ordinary Americans — most of whom aren't suspected of any crime.
"It's the largest database ever assembled in the world," said one person, who, like the others who agreed to talk about the NSA's activities, declined to be identified by name or affiliation. The agency's goal is "to create a database of every call ever made" within the nation's borders, this person added.
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One major telecommunications company declined to participate in the program: Qwest. According to sources familiar with the events, Qwest's CEO at the time, Joe Nacchio, was deeply troubled by the NSA's assertion that Qwest didn't need a court order — or approval under FISA — to proceed. Adding to the tension, Qwest was unclear about who, exactly, would have access to its customers' information and how that information might be used. Financial implications were also a concern, the sources said. Carriers that illegally divulge calling information can be subjected to heavy fines. The NSA was asking Qwest to turn over millions of records. The fines, in the aggregate, could have been substantial. The NSA told Qwest that other government agencies, including the FBI, CIA and DEA, also might have access to the database, the sources said. As a matter of practice, the NSA regularly shares its information — known as "product" in intelligence circles — with other intelligence groups. Even so, Qwest's lawyers were troubled by the expansiveness of the NSA request, the sources said. The NSA, which needed Qwest's participation to completely cover the country, pushed back hard. Trying to put pressure on Qwest, NSA representatives pointedly told Qwest that it was the lone holdout among the big telecommunications companies. It also tried appealing to Qwest's patriotic side: In one meeting, an NSA representative suggested that Qwest's refusal to contribute to the database could compromise national security, one person recalled. In addition, the agency suggested that Qwest's foot-dragging might affect its ability to get future classified work with the government. Like other big telecommunications companies, Qwest already had classified contracts and hoped to get more. Unable to get comfortable with what NSA was proposing, Qwest's lawyers asked NSA to take its proposal to the FISA court. According to the sources, the agency refused. The NSA's explanation did littl
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