FBI and Access to NSA Data on Americans

Peter Van Buren

Hear that hissing sound? That is the last gasps for air from the Bill of Rights. The Bill is one breath away from hell.

The FBI has quietly revised its rules for searching data involving Americans’ communications collected by the National Security Agency.

The classified revisions were accepted by the secret U.S. FISA court that governs surveillance, under a set of powers colloquially known as Section 702. That is the portion of law that authorizes the NSA’s sweeping PRISM program, among other atrocities.

PRISM, and other surveillance programs, first came to mainstream public attention with the information leaked by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden, preceeded by other NSA whistleblowers such as Thomas Drake and Bill Binney.

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