The scope of the US Govt, spying on our own citizens should be terribly disturbing to all consumers and citizens of this country.
But if they’re monitoring for crimes does this mean they’ve kept records of the bankers and all their foreclosure crimes?
By Lawrence Hurley and Joseph Menn
WASHINGTON/SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – U.S. Internet companies that want to resist government demands to hand over customer data for intelligence investigations have few legal options, due to the classified nature of such probes and a court review process shrouded in secrecy.
Google Inc (GOOG.O), Facebook Inc (FB.O) and Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O) are among the big U.S. technology companies that were outed this week as key sources of data for the National Security Agency (NSA), under a surveillance program referred to inside the spy agency as Prism.
While the companies have uniformly denied knowledge of Prism and said they had not given the NSA direct access to their servers, U.S. officials have confirmed the existence of the program, which President Barack Obama defended as “a modest encroachment” on privacy that was necessary to protect national security.
The program relies on section 702 of the 2008 amended version of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which lets the government collect electronic communications for the purpose of acquiring intelligence on non-U.S. targets that pose a threat to national security.
For electronic service providers, the law says the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court in Washington can authorize a company to provide “all information, facilities, or assistance necessary.” In return for compliance, the company is compensated for its work and receives immunity from potential lawsuits.
