Secret court approves Obama's limits on NSA phone record collection [feedly]

Secret court approves Obama's limits on NSA phone record collection
http://feedly.com/e/uOZcKDG3

The secret FISA court has approved two of President Barack Obama's proposed changes to how the NSA can use its collection of American phone records. While many of Obama's suggestions will take months to implement, if they go into effect at all, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper wrote yesterday that the court had agreed to two immediate limits. Except in cases of "true emergency," every use of the database — which includes metadata like calling history for virtually all American phone numbers — will now have to be approved beforehand by the FISA court on the basis of a reasonable, articulable suspicion that the search criteria is tied to a known terrorist organization. While agents could previously search within three connections of "hops" of a number, they're now limited to two hops.

These changes were the most obvious and immediate proposals in Obama's speech, much of which was devoted to plans that either relied on Congressional action or would require a long period of examination by intelligence agencies. Unfortunately, because the court's decisions are secret, we can't actually see the text of the motion it approved. It did, however, order the government to determine whether that motion can be released to the public, along with the original order covering these metadata searches and the amended version. That review will be finished by February 17th, and whatever is released will be posted online.