Government Surveillance Programs: Are They Allowed to Do That?

Following the reveal of two of the government's broad surveillance programs last week, the American public has been left with many unanswered questions and general concerns regarding these programs' purposes and legality. In an effort to answer these some of these questions, the Brennan Center for Justice has released a fact sheet that examines "the legal and practical steps the government may have taken to secretly collect data."

Two of the main questions answered on the fact sheet are: •What is the National Security Agency (NSA) doing? •What are the legal justifications for the programs?

The first question reflects one of the American public's main concerns: the PRISM program. PRISM has been revealed as a computer network that allows the government "unprecedented access to the data processed by nine leading U.S. internet companies." A few of the companies involved include some of the biggest names of the internet realm, such as Google, Facebook, Skype and Apple. According to the fact sheet, however, "NSA only obtains data with court approval and with the knowledge of the companies."

In response to the second question regarding the PRISM program, the Brennan Center found that the government cites Section 702 of the FISA (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act) Amendment Act as justification for the program, a Section which "allows the government to acquire foreign intelligence by targeting non-U.S. persons 'reasonably believed' to be outside U.S. borders." The fact sheet maintains that this "can be difficult to ascertain when dealing with internet or cell phone communications," but that, under the same legal premise, the government must also adopt "'minimization procedures' to guard against the inadvertent collection, retention, and dissemination of information about U.S. persons."

The fact sheet also responds to the following questions: •Is there any oversight? •Do communications providers have a say? •What about individuals? •If these laws were passed by Congress, and the FBI and NSA are securing the required court approval and making the required disclosures to Congress, what's the problem? Isn't everything working the way it's supposed to?

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