Obama to Call for End to N.S.A.’s Bulk Data Collection.

Obama to Call for End to N.S.A.’s Bulk Data Collection

From the article:

The Obama administration is preparing to unveil a legislative proposal for a far-reaching overhaul of the National Security Agency’s once-secret bulk phone records program in a way that — if approved by Congress — would end the aspect that has most alarmed privacy advocates since its existence was leaked last year, according to senior administration officials.

Under the proposal, they said, the N.S.A. would end its systematic collection of data about Americans’ calling habits. The bulk records would stay in the hands of phone companies, which would not be required to retain the data for any longer than they normally would. And the N.S.A. could obtain specific records only with permission from a judge, using a new kind of court order.

The new type of surveillance court orders envisioned by the administration would require phone companies to swiftly provide records in a technologically compatible data format, including making available, on a continuing basis, data about any new calls placed or received after the order is received, the officials said.

They would also allow the government to swiftly seek related records for callers up to two phone calls, or “hops,” removed from the number that has come under suspicion, even if those callers are customers of other companies.

The N.S.A. now retains the phone data for five years. But the administration considered and rejected imposing a mandate on phone companies that they hold on to their customers’ calling records for a period longer than the 18 months that federal regulations already generally require — a burden that the companies had resisted shouldering and that was seen as a major obstacle to keeping the data in their hands. A senior administration official said that intelligence agencies had concluded that the operational impact of that change would be small because older data is less important.

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• I will believe it when it is done, not a second before.
• I still have concerns about the FISA court.
• I don't agree with this "hop" arrangement for "swiftly" getting access to records for phone data about persons two phone calls removed from the number that has come under suspicion.
• Remember to always laugh and not take seriously Time magazine for choosing the Pope over Edward Snowden for Person of the Year.

It's going to be fun seeing all the dems who were defending the program now backtrack and preach how great it is that Obama is ending it.

By doing this, the terrorists win. Thanks Obama.

I'd like the federal government to mind its own business and not interfere in other people lives. Government is not the solution. Government is the problem. Reagan had it right.

I'm just waiting for 9/11 2.0 now.