FISA Court Won’t Reconsider Phone Data Collection

Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court rejected a request by a civil liberties watchdog group to re-examine an order authorizing the US to collect call data from phone companies.

The Center for National Security Studies “has no standing to move for reconsideration of a decision,” Judge Mary McLaughlin wrote. Judge McLaughlin also rejected the center’s request that the government declassify documents explaining arguments for the legality of the data program, known as bulk telephony metadata collection. The ruling comes amid a growing debate over privacy linked to the Obama Administration’s data gathering program, overseen by the National Security Agency. A federal judge in Washington on Dec. 16 said the NSA’s telephone data surveillance program probably violates constitutional privacy rights, a ruling that may lay the foundation for the US Supreme Court to review the matter. McLaughlin’s ruling concerns the periodic reauthorization of bulk telephone data collection required under the Patriot Act, the federal law enacted after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.