The ACLU Strikes Back... At The Recent Ruling In Favor Of NSA Mass Phone Surveillance

[RT] The American Civil Liberties Union has filed an appeal against the US National Security Agency’s indiscriminate collection of telephone metadata after the group’s suit seeking to halt the policy was dismissed last week.

The ACLU first filed suit against Director of National Intelligence James Clapper in June 2013, just after the Edward Snowden’s disclosure about the classified NSA program that regularly compels phone companies to provide the government with millions of phone records. The civil liberties advocacy group argued that the program violated Americans’ First and Fourth Amendment rights.

US District Judge William Pauley disagreed, dismissing the case on December 27 and declaring that the NSA program is subject to harsh oversight and is needed to effectively fight terrorism.

“There is no evidence that the government has used any of the bulk telephony metadata it collected for any purpose other than investigating and disrupting terrorist attacks,” he wrote. “While there have been unintentional violation of guidelines, those appear to stem from human error and the incredibly complex computer programs that support this vital tool.”

The ACLU vowed immediately that is would press on and on Thursday filed an appeal again challenging the collection program, which does not monitor individual conversations but tracks numbers dialed, as well as the time and duration of the calls. Jameel Jaffer, ACLU deputy legal director, said he expects the Second Circuit Court of appeals to hear oral arguments on the case in the springtime.

Read full story