With Confirmed NSA Spying: Private Briefings Will Begin, But Public Discussions and Public Investigations Must Prevail

The world was provided confirmation last week of widespread, unconstitutional domestic surveillance of innocent Americans' call records and online activity. But, starting this week, congressional staffers will be briefed in private, newspapers will be forced to report second-hand on what occurred in those briefings, and the public will, once again, be left out of discussions vital to our representative democracy. These discussions should be occurring in public, in an open forum, and for all to hear. Secret briefings, identical to those going on now, were carried out in 2006, after the first disclosure of the NSA's domestic spying program occurred. Seven years later, the program has only grown bigger and more dangerous. This is why we encourage you to call your Senator now and demand that public hearings occur.

Politicians must take an aggressive approach during the upcoming briefings, hearings, and investigations. First, they must determine the true scope of the two different programs—the business records program (Section 215 of the PATRIOT Act) and the PRISM surveillance program based on Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Then, elected officials must push for disclosure of the full domestic surveillance apparatus operated by the NSA. Politicians need to be careful that officials do not play word games or offer "the least untruthful"—also known as misleading—answers.

Some hearings have touched on the issue, like the recent Senate Apropriations Committee (video) hearing. But the first hearing that must touch on some of these questions will take place this Thursday. The House Judiciary Committee will hold a hearing on the Oversight of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). The FBI, along with the NSA, is at the center of the spying storm, and FBI Director Robert Mueller has been involved with the NSA's program nearly from its inception.  

With that, here are some questions politicians must ask at the hearing:

General

1) What are the names, capabilities, and purposes of surveillance programs that rely on Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act authorities, other electronic surveillance statutes, or voluntary cooperation of service providers to acquire or collect widespread information—whether by computer or human—of American communications (defined to include both “metadata” and “content”)?

2) The business records program and the PRISM program have been confirmed by statements of the Director of National Intelligence. It has also been reported that the NSA intercepts information from upstream providers through operations codenamed “Fairview” and “Blarney.” How do "BLARNEY" and "FAIRVIEW" operate, what information is obtained through the programs, and what is their purpose?

3) It has been widely reported that the intelligence community relies on uncommon definitions of common terms. Can you define the terms "collect," "acquire," "intercept," and "content"? If a computer or other device obtains, scans or processes Americans' communications or communications records (on behalf of the government), has the government collected the data? Or must a human being actually perceive the data before you deem that the government collected it?

4) The Washington Post noted that under the NSA's domestic spying program, quarterly reports describing the number of accidental collections of U.S. person content is retained and disseminated to officials. When are you releasing these reports? 

5) How long does the intelligence community retain the information obtained under these authorities? Under what circumstances, if any, are acquired communications (or communications records) deleted?

Section 215

6) Section 215 of the PATRIOT Act authorizes the FB