From phone calls to social media chatter, the outlines of the US government’s far-reaching electronic surveillance have come to light more than a decade since the massive spying effort began.
Digital activists and cyber experts had long speculated that America’s vast spy machine likely enjoyed virtually unhindered access to any phone call or online communication, as part of the “war on terror.”
But this week’s dramatic revelations in the Guardian and the Washington Post confirmed suspicions that the 9/11 attacks spawned an unprecedented domestic dragnet by the secretive National Security Agency (NSA), which had previously focused on eavesdropping and codebreaking abroad.
Here is a brief summary of the domestic surveillance programs and the controversial laws that authorized them:
– Using phone records for “data-mining”
After the attacks of September 11, 2001, President George W. Bush authorizes the NSA to carry out a range of electronic surveillance inside the United States, including calls between Americans and potential terrorist suspects.
In 2005, the Bush administration orders telecoms firms to hand over the phone records of customers. The NSA then trawls through the records using algorithms to spot patterns that could signal possible plotting by terror suspects.
Under the program, which was renewed in 2011, authorities must seek a warrant for the operation every three months from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, a court that operates behind closed doors. The warrants allow a search through phone record “meta-data,” including the times of phone calls and the duration, but not the content of the conversations, officials say.
– Internet surveillance
The NSA and the FBI are directly tapping central servers at nine US Internet companies, to allow for round-the-clock monitoring of emails, documents, video, social media posts and photos online.
The firms reportedly are Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, Paltalk, AOL, Skype, YouTube and Apple. Dubbed PRISM, the secret program has been in operation since 2007, the Washington Post reported. Microsoft was reportedly the first of the Internet giants to agree to the requests while Apple agreed last year.
Analysts at the NSA can sift through the massive stream of data looking for terms that could reveal a potential Al-Qaeda link. The search terms reportedly are designed to produce at least 51 percent confidence in a target’s “foreignness.”
The US spy chief, James Clapper, insists only foreigners outside the United States are targeted by the PRISM program and that there are procedures to minimize retaining “incidentally acquired information about US persons.”
Another surveillance program, known as “BLARNEY,” vacuums up device signatures, address packets and other key technical Internet data.
Several of the Silicon Valley companies have denied they allowed direct or unlimited access to their main servers.
– Laws for digital eavesdropping
In 1994, president Bill Clinton signed a law requiring telecom companies to modify their equipment to allow for surveillance, making it easier for authorities to eavesdrop on digital phone networks.
In 2005, the Federal Communications Commission expanded the scope of the law to cover data over the Internet, forcing broadband companies to ensure VOIP (voice over Internet protocol) phone calls could be wiretapped by the government.
The surveillance PRISM program that taps into Internet firms’ servers is likely based on section 215 of the Patriot Act, which allows secret court orders requiring American companies to hand over business records.
The government appears to have relied on a secret interpretation of section 215, which dismayed some lawmakers when the Patriot Act came up for renewal two years ago.
Advocates of the Patriot Act, adopted after the 9/11 attacks, argue it is necessary to empower law enforcement agencies to track terror threats.
Full reach of US surveillance effort exposed
