Scope of Surveillance Programs Revealed
June 7, 2013
James R. Clapper, the director of the National Security Agency, confirmed yesterday that the federal government has for nearly six years been collecting information on foreigners overseas from such Internet companies as Apple and Google and from the social networking site Facebook. Director Clapper stated yesterday that the classified program to collect information from Internet providers is used to “protect our nation from a wide variety of threats,” including terrorist attacks. Awareness of the huge scope of the Internet program became public just hours after federal officials acknowledged that for the last seven years the government has collected from the phone company Verizon records of millions of telephone calls made inside the United States.
President Barack Obama defended the surveillance programs to reporters while on a visit to San Jose, California. “Nobody is listening to your telephone calls,” President Obama said. “That’s not what this program is about. As was indicated, what the intelligence community is doing is looking at the numbers and durations of calls. They’re not looking at names and they’re not looking at content, but sifting through this so-called meta data, they may identify potential leads with respect to people that might engage in terrorism.” President Obama also discussed society’s need to balance privacy and security.
These National Security Agency telephone and Internet surveillance programs began under President George W. Bush in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks and have been authorized repeatedly by Congress. A secret court validated the program before it went into effect.
Additional World Book articles:
- Congress of the United States 2001 (a Back in Time article)
- Terrorism: America’s New Enemy (a special report)