Sunday, May 01, 2016

Prosecutors would kill for a court this accomodating


In the last year the FISA court, which is charged with ensuring that the various secret agencies spying on American citizens stay with in the ever looser bounds of law, accepted every request for a secret warrant.
A secret court that oversees the US government's surveillance requests accepted every warrant that was submitted last year, according to new figures.

The Washington DC.-based Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court received 1,457 requests from the National Security Agency and the Federal Bureau of Investigation to intercept phone calls and emails.

In long-standing fashion, the court did not reject a single warrant, entirely or in part.

The FBI also issued 48,642 national security letters, a subpoena-like power that compels a company to turn over data on national security grounds without informing the subject of the letter.

The memo said the majority of these demands sought data on foreigners, but almost one-in-five were requests for data on Americans.

The figures are reported annually by the Justice Dept. to members of Congress, but have yet to be formally released. Reuters first reported the soon-to-be-released figures.

The work of the court is shrouded in secrecy. Founded in 1978, the so-called FISA Court was tasked with processing government requests for surveillance against foreign targets. It was this court that approved a number of controversial programs, such as PRISM and the phone records collection program, which were later leaked by whistleblower Edward Snowden to journalists.
12 rejected requests. Probably from the early days before the judges fully understood their roles is this peculiar sort of "justice".

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