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64-727: Intelligence gathered by the United States government inside the United States or specifically targeting US citizens is legally required to be gathered in compliance with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (FISA) and under the authority of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISA court). NSA global data mining projects have existed for decades, but recent programs of intelligence gathering and analysis that include data gathered from inside

128-432: A 2006 opinion, Judge Richard Posner wrote that FISA "retains value as a framework for monitoring the communications of known terrorists, but it is hopeless as a framework for detecting terrorists. [FISA] requires that surveillance be conducted pursuant to warrants based on probable cause to believe that the target of surveillance is a terrorist, when the desperate need is to find out who is a terrorist." The ACLU considers

192-457: A FAQ regardless of whether the questions are actually frequently asked. Since the acronym FAQ originated in textual media, its pronunciation varies. FAQ can be pronounced as an initialism , "F-A-Q", or as an acronym , "FAQ". Web designers often label a single list of questions as a "FAQ", such as on Google Search , while using "FAQs" to denote multiple lists of questions such as on United States Treasury sites. Use of "FAQ" to refer to

256-642: A FISA order. The court affirmed the denial of the motion. There, the court flatly rejected claims that FISA violated Due process clause of the Fifth Amendment , Equal protection , Separation of powers , nor the Right to counsel provided by the Sixth Amendment . However, in a third case, the special review court for FISA, the equivalent of a Circuit Court of Appeals, opined differently. In In re Sealed Case , 310 F.3d 717, 742 (FISA Ct. Rev. 2002),

320-574: A foreign government, any faction of a foreign nation not substantially composed of U.S. persons , and any entity directed or controlled by a foreign government. The definition also includes groups engaged in international terrorism and foreign political organizations. The sections of FISA authorizing electronic surveillance and physical searches without a court order specifically exclude their application to groups engaged in international terrorism. A "U.S. person" includes citizens, lawfully admitted permanent resident aliens, and corporations incorporated in

384-602: A form of that program in Section 702. The subchapters of FISA provide for: Generally, the statute permits electronic surveillance in two different scenarios. The President may authorize, through the Attorney General , electronic surveillance without a court order for the period of one year, provided that it is only to acquire foreign intelligence information, that it is solely directed at communications or property controlled exclusively by foreign powers, that there

448-624: A government application to, and order issuing from, the FISA Court. The Act provides procedures for the government to "certify" the legality of an acquisition program, for the government to issue directives to providers to provide data or assistance under a particular program, and for the government and recipient of a directive to seek from the FISA Court, respectively, an order to compel provider compliance or relief from an unlawful directive. Providers receive costs and full immunity from civil suits for compliance with any directives issued pursuant to

512-464: A single frequently asked question, in and of itself, is less common. While the name may be recent, the FAQ format itself is quite old. For example, Matthew Hopkins wrote The Discovery of Witches in 1648 as a list of questions and answers, introduced as "Certaine Queries answered ...". Many old catechisms are in a question-and-answer (Q&A) format. Summa Theologica , written by Thomas Aquinas in

576-536: Is a United States federal law that establishes procedures for the surveillance and collection of foreign intelligence on domestic soil. FISA was enacted in response to revelations of widespread privacy violations by the federal government under president Richard Nixon . It requires federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies to obtain authorization for gathering "foreign intelligence information" between "foreign powers" and "agents of foreign powers" suspected of espionage or terrorism . The law established

640-511: Is counting and analysing DNI (internet) and DNR (telephony) metadata records passing through the NSA's signals intelligence systems, and are therefore not showing how much content of internet and telephone communications is intercepted. Data analyzed by Boundless Informant includes electronic surveillance program records and telephone call metadata records stored in an NSA data archive called GM-PLACE. It does not include FISA data, according to

704-478: Is found under the subchapter pertaining to physical searches. In both cases, the statute creates an affirmative defense for law enforcement personnel acting within their official duties and pursuant to a valid court order. Presumably, such a defense is not available to those operating exclusively under presidential authorization. In 1967, the Supreme Court of the United States held that the requirements of

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768-732: Is necessary in order to understand the intelligence or believes that the person was committing a crime. The Attorney General is required to make a certification of these conditions under seal to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court , and report on their compliance to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence . Since 50 U.S.C.   § 1802 (a)(1)(A) of this Act specifically limits warrantless surveillance to foreign powers as defined by 50 U.S.C. §1801(a) (1),(2),(3) and omits

832-434: Is no substantial likelihood that it will acquire the contents of any communication to which a United States person is a party, and that it be conducted only in accordance with defined minimization procedures. The code defines "foreign intelligence information" to mean information necessary to protect the United States against actual or potential grave attack, sabotage or international terrorism . "Foreign powers" means

896-493: Is not information that we collected on European citizens. It represents information that we and our NATO allies have collected in defense of our countries and in support of military operations." Although the initial reports in European media stated that the various charts presented the numbers of phone calls intercepted by NSA, a PowerPoint presentation and a FAQ document published by The Guardian say that BoundlessInformant

960-431: Is requested is used or will be used by that foreign power or its agent. In addition, the court must find that the proposed surveillance meet certain "minimization requirements" for information pertaining to U.S. persons. If the foreign power's suspected agent communicates with Americans, the communications of U.S. citizens are incidentally intercepted even though they are not the targets of the surveillance. Depending on

1024-524: Is subject to both criminal penalties and civil liabilities. Under 50 U.S.C. § 1811, the President may also authorize warrantless surveillance at the beginning of a war. Specifically, he may authorize such surveillance "for a period not to exceed fifteen calendar days following a declaration of war by the Congress". Alternatively, the government may seek a court order permitting the surveillance using

1088-607: The Bush administration and carried out by the National Security Agency since 2002; a subsequent Bloomberg article suggested this may have already begun by June 2000. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales later confirmed the existence of the program, which was codenamed Stellar Wind . Without obtaining a FISA warrant, the NSA monitored phone calls , Internet activities, text messages, and other forms of communication involving any party it believed to be outside

1152-491: The Church Committee that foreign intelligence surveillance legislation should include provisions for programmatically authorizing surveillance programs because of the particular needs of foreign intelligence where "virtually continuous surveillance, which by its nature does not have specifically predetermined targets" may be required. In these situations, "the efficiency of a warrant requirement would be minimal." In

1216-559: The Department of Justice . There is no provision for a release of information regarding such hearings, or for the record of information actually collected. The USA Freedom Act (Section 402), however, requires the government to declassify and publicly release "to the greatest extent practicable" each order, decision and opinion of the court if it contains a "significant construction or interpretation of law." FISC meets in secret, and approves or denies requests for search warrants . Only

1280-711: The Federal Bureau of Investigation and the National Security Agency ) against suspected foreign intelligence agents inside the U.S. The court is located within the E. Barrett Prettyman United States Courthouse in Washington, D.C. The court is staffed by eleven judges appointed by the Chief Justice of the United States to serve seven-year terms. Proceedings before the FISA court are ex parte and non-adversarial. The court hears evidence presented solely by

1344-470: The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) to oversee requests for surveillance warrants. Although FISA was initially limited to government use of electronic surveillance, subsequent amendments have broadened the law to regulate other intelligence-gathering methods, including physical searches, pen register and trap and trace (PR/TT) devices, and compelling the production of certain types of business records. FISA has been repeatedly amended since

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1408-592: The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Improvement and Enhancement Act of 2006 ( S. 3001 ) asserting FISA as the exclusive means to conduct foreign intelligence surveillance. All three competing bills were the subject of Judiciary Committee hearings throughout the summer. On September 13, 2006, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted to approve all three mutually exclusive bills, thus, leaving it to

1472-595: The Fourth Amendment applied equally to electronic surveillance and to physical searches. Katz v. United States , 389 U.S. 347 (1967). The Court did not address whether such requirements apply to issues of national security . Shortly after, in 1972, the Court took up the issue again in United States v. United States District Court, Plamondon , 407 U.S. 297 (1972), where the court held that court approval

1536-985: The Norwegian Intelligence Service , after a chart about Norway was published on November 19. On February 4, 2014, the Dutch government revealed that the 1.8 million metadata in the chart about the Netherlands were not collected by NSA, but instead by the Dutch Military Intelligence and Security Service (MIVD), also to support military operations, which almost led to the resignation of the Dutch interior minister . On October 29, 2013, NSA-director Keith B. Alexander declared that accusations in French, Spanish and Italian media about NSA intercepting millions of phone calls from these countries are "completely false". He added that "This

1600-641: The September 11 attacks , with several added provisions garnering political and public controversy due to privacy concerns. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) was introduced on May 18, 1977, by Senator Ted Kennedy and was signed into law by President Carter on 25 October 1978. The bill was cosponsored by nine Senators: Birch Bayh , James O. Eastland , Jake Garn , Walter Huddleston , Daniel Inouye , Charles Mathias , John L. McClellan , Gaylord Nelson , and Strom Thurmond . The FISA resulted from extensive investigations by Senate Committees into

1664-522: The color of law or through disclosing information known to have been obtained through unauthorized surveillance. The penalties for either act are fines up to US$ 10,000, up to five years in jail, or both. In addition, the statute creates a cause of action for private individuals whose communications were unlawfully monitored. The statute permits actual damages of not less than $ 1,000 or $ 100 per day. In addition, that statute authorizes punitive damages and an award of attorney's fees . Similar liability

1728-590: The defendants were members of the Irish Republican Army . They were convicted for various violations regarding the shipment of explosives and firearms . The court held that there were compelling considerations of national security in the distinction between the treatment of U.S. citizens and non-resident aliens. In the United States v. Nicholson , 955 F. Supp. 588 (E.D. Va. 1997), the defendant moved to suppress all evidence gathered under

1792-667: The 2020 case, United States v. Moalin , the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the federal government violated FISA, and possibly the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, when it collected the telephony metadata of millions of Americans. Both the subchapters covering physical searches and electronic surveillance provide for criminal and civil liability for violations of FISA. Criminal sanctions follows violations of electronic surveillance by intentionally engaging in electronic surveillance under

1856-558: The Act. Frequently Asked Questions A frequently asked questions ( FAQ ) list is often used in articles, websites, email lists , and online forums where common questions tend to recur, for example through posts or queries by new users related to common knowledge gaps. The purpose of a FAQ is generally to provide information on frequent questions or concerns; however, the format is a useful means of organizing information, and text consisting of questions and their answers may thus be called

1920-667: The FAQ memo. PRISM , a government codename for a collection effort known officially as US-984XN, which was revealed at the same time as Boundless Informant, is one source of DNR data. According to published slides, Boundless Informant leverages Free and Open Source Software —and is therefore "available to all NSA developers"—and corporate services hosted in the cloud . The tool uses HDFS , MapReduce , and Accumulo (formerly Cloudbase) for data processing. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 ( FISA , Pub. L.   95–511 , 92  Stat.   1783 , 50 U.S.C. ch. 36 )

1984-449: The FIS court. This is called the traditional intelligence collection, because it is "the targeted monitoring of a suspected clandestine operative of a foreign power." Approval of a FISA application requires the court find probable cause that the target of the surveillance be a "foreign power" or an "agent of a foreign power" inside the United States and that the places at which surveillance

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2048-474: The FISA Act to be unconstitutional for several reasons including: the law was designed to mainly address terrorism threats, but in fact intercepts communications that have nothing to do with terrorism or criminal activity of any kind; and that "the government can create huge databases that contain information about U.S. persons obtained without warrants and then search these databases at a later point." The Act

2112-460: The FISA courts to issue surveillance and physical search orders without having to find a connection between the "lone wolf" and a foreign government or terrorist group. However, "if the court authorizes such a surveillance or physical search using this new definition of 'agent of a foreign power', the FISC judge has to find, in pertinent part, that, based upon the information provided by the applicant for

2176-469: The FISC may be appealed to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review . The Court of Review is a three-judge panel. Since its creation, the court has come into session twice: in 2002 and 2008. In addition to electronic surveillance, FISA permits the "physical search" of the "premises, information, material, or property used exclusively by" a foreign power. The requirements and procedures are nearly identical to those for electronic surveillance. In

2240-812: The NSA beginning in October 2012, specifically with two superiors in the Hawaii regional base of the NSA Threat Operations Center and two superiors in the Technology Directorate of the NSA. Snowden states that he brought up these concerns through the Dissent Channel . Snowden added that coworkers often were "astonished to learn" about this detail and did not wish to know any more about the program, and that until April 2012 he often asked these colleagues "What do you think

2304-474: The Protect America Act of 2007, communications that begin or end in a foreign country may be wiretapped by the U.S. government without supervision by the FISA Court. The Act removes from the definition of "electronic surveillance" in FISA any surveillance directed at a person reasonably believed to be located outside the United States. As such, surveillance of these communications no longer requires

2368-508: The U.S., regardless of whether part of the communication took place domestically. The Bush administration initially defended the program as an extension of executive authority ; amid public, political, and legal pressure, the program was ended in January 2007 and the government announced it would seek warrants from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC). Following the controversy over Stellar Wind , Congress later legalized

2432-605: The United States subject to enhanced Congressional oversight. Also on March 16, 2006, Senator Arlen Specter (R-PA) introduced the National Security Surveillance Act of 2006 ( S. 2453 ), which would amend FISA to grant retroactive amnesty for warrantless surveillance conducted under presidential authority and provide FISA court (FISC) jurisdiction to review, authorize, and oversight "electronic surveillance programs". On May 24, 2006, Senator Specter and Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) introduced

2496-624: The United States such as PRISM were enabled by changes to US surveillance law introduced under President Bush and renewed under President Obama in December 2012. Boundless Informant was first publicly revealed on June 8, 2013, after classified documents about the program were leaked to The Guardian . This report contained a Top Secret heat map produced by the Boundless Informant program summarizing data records from 504 separate DNR and DNI collection sources or SIGADs . In

2560-418: The United States. "Minimization procedures" limit the collection of information concerning United States persons by protecting their identities and requiring a court order to retain the communications for longer than 72 hours. The communications can be retained without court order if there is evidence of a crime. Identification of a US person, known as "unmasking", may also be authorized if an agency believes it

2624-554: The United States. Surveillance beyond the initial authorized period would require a FISA warrant or a presidential certification to Congress. On September 28, 2006, the House of Representatives passed Wilson's bill and it was referred to the Senate. On July 28, 2007, President Bush called on Congress to pass legislation to reform the FISA in order to ease restrictions on surveillance of terrorist suspects where one party (or both parties) to

Boundless Informant - Misplaced Pages Continue

2688-520: The accumulated FAQs across all Usenet newsgroups sparked the creation of the "*.answers" moderated newsgroups such as comp.answers, misc.answers and sci.answers for crossposting and collecting FAQ across respective comp.*, misc.*, sci.* newsgroups. The FAQ has become an important component of websites, either as a stand-alone page or as a website section with multiple subpages per question or topic. Embedded links to FAQ pages have become commonplace in website navigation bars, bodies, or footers. The FAQ page

2752-442: The communication are located overseas. He asked that Congress pass the legislation before its August 2007 recess. On August 3, 2007, the Senate passed a Republican-sponsored version of FISA ( S. 1927 ) in a vote of 60 to 28. The House followed by passing the bill, 227–183. The Protect America Act of 2007 ( Pub. L.   110–55 (text) (PDF) , S. 1927 ) was then signed into law by George W. Bush on August 5, 2007. Under

2816-518: The content of phone calls, but only the metadata thereof (see below ). A second correction is about by whom and where these data were collected. On August 5, a week after the publication of a chart from BoundlessInformant in Germany, the German intelligence agency (BND) said that they collected these data from foreign communications, related to military operations abroad. A similar statement was made by

2880-534: The courts upheld warrantless wiretaps. In Brown , a U.S. citizen's conversation was captured by a wiretap authorized by the Attorney General for foreign intelligence purposes. In Butenko , the court held a wiretap valid if the primary purpose was for gathering foreign intelligence information. A plurality opinion in Zweibon v. Mitchell , 516 F.2d 594 (D.C. Cir. 1975), held that a warrant was required for

2944-484: The data that NSA allegedly collected from several European countries between December 10, 2012 and January 8, 2013. These charts were published by a major news outlet from each of these countries: Initially, these media wrote that the BoundlessInformant charts showed how many phone calls the NSA intercepted from a particular country. A first correction of this interpretation is that the program doesn't count

3008-474: The definitions contained in 50 U.S.C. §1801(a) (4),(5),(6) the act does not authorize the use of warrantless surveillance on: groups engaged in international terrorism or activities in preparation thereof; foreign-based political organizations, not substantially composed of United States persons; or entities that are directed and controlled by a foreign government or governments. Under FISA, anyone who engages in electronic surveillance except as authorized by statute

3072-467: The domestic surveillance of a domestic organization. In this case, the court found that the domestic organization was not a "foreign power or their agent", and "absent exigent circumstances, all warrantless electronic surveillance is unreasonable and therefore unconstitutional." There have been very few cases involving the constitutionality of FISA. Two lower court decisions found FISA constitutional. In United States v. Duggan , 743 F.2d 59 (2d Cir. 1984),

3136-410: The first daily FAQ. In some cases, informative documents not in the traditional FAQ style have also been described as FAQs, particularly the video game FAQ, which is often a detailed description of gameplay, including tips, secrets, and beginning-to-end guidance. Rarely are videogame FAQs in a question-and-answer format, although they may contain a short section of questions and answers. Over time,

3200-527: The full Senate to resolve. On July 18, 2006, U.S. Representative Heather Wilson (R-NM) introduced the Electronic Surveillance Modernization Act ( H.R. 5825 ). Wilson's bill would give the President the authority to authorize electronic surveillance of international phone calls and e-mail linked specifically to identified terrorist groups immediately following or in anticipation of an armed or terrorist attack on

3264-492: The legality of domestic intelligence activities. These investigations were led separately by Sam Ervin and Frank Church in 1978 as a response to President Richard Nixon 's usage of federal resources, including law enforcement agencies, to spy on political and activist groups. The law itself was crafted in large part in closed door meetings between legislators and members of the Justice Department . The act

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3328-617: The map, countries that are under surveillance are assigned a color from green to red (which does not correspond to intensity of surveillance). As this map shows that almost 3 billion data elements from inside the United States were captured by the NSA over a 30-day period ending in March 2013, Snowden stated that this tool was collecting more information on Americans located within the United States than on Russians in Russia . Snowden stated that he had raised concerns about this with his superiors at

3392-504: The number of warrants applied for, issued and denied, is reported. In 1980 (the first full year after its inception), it approved 322 warrants. This number has steadily grown to 2,224 warrants in 2006. In the period 1979–2006, a total of 22,990 applications for warrants were made to the Court of which 22,985 were approved (sometimes with modifications; or with the splitting up, or combining, of warrants for legal purposes), and only 5 were definitively rejected. Denials of FISA applications by

3456-538: The order, the target had engaged in or was engaging in international terrorism or activities in preparation therefor". On March 16, 2006, Senators Mike DeWine (R-OH), Lindsey Graham (R-SC), Chuck Hagel (R-NE), and Olympia Snowe (R-ME) introduced the Terrorist Surveillance Act of 2006 (S.2455), under which the President would be given certain additional limited statutory authority to conduct electronic surveillance of suspected terrorists in

3520-500: The presumption was that new users would download archived past messages through FTP . In practice this rarely happened, and the users tended to post questions to the mailing list instead of searching its archives. Repeating the "right" answers became tedious, and went against developing netiquette . A series of different measures were set up by loosely affiliated groups of computer system administrators, from regularly posted messages to netlib -like query email daemons . The acronym FAQ

3584-449: The public would do if this was on the front page?" Vanee Vines, an NSA spokesperson, stated that "After extensive investigation, including interviews with his former NSA supervisors and co-workers, we have not found any evidence to support Mr. Snowden's contention that he brought these matters to anyone's attention." The first publication about Boundless Informant was followed by screenshots from this program showing charts with details about

3648-405: The second half of the 13th century, is a series of common questions about Christianity to which he wrote a series of replies. The "FAQ" is an Internet textual tradition originating from the technical limitations of early mailing lists from NASA in the early 1980s. The first FAQ developed over several pre-Web years, starting from 1982 when storage was expensive. On ARPANET 's SPACE mailing list,

3712-835: The special court stated "[A]ll the other courts to have decided the issue [have] held that the President did have inherent authority to conduct warrantless searches to obtain foreign intelligence information . ... We take for granted that the President does have that authority and, assuming that is so, FISA could not encroach on the President's constitutional power." K. A. Taipale of the World Policy Institute, James Jay Carafano of The Heritage Foundation , and Philip Bobbitt of Columbia Law School, among others, have argued that FISA may need to be amended to include, among other things, procedures for programmatic approvals, as it may no longer be adequate to address certain foreign intelligence needs and technology developments, including:

3776-595: The transition from circuit-based communications to packet-based communications; the globalization of telecommunication infrastructure; and the development of automated monitoring techniques, including data mining and traffic analysis . John R. Schmidt, associate attorney general (1994–1997) in the Justice Department under President Bill Clinton, expressed a need for programmatic approval of technology-enabled surveillance programs. He recalled early arguments made by then-Attorney General Edward Levi to

3840-499: The type of surveillance, approved orders or extensions of orders may be active for 90 days, 120 days, or a year. FISA warrants require renewal depending on the type of surveillance and type of warrant either every 90 days (if targeting a U.S. person) or 120 days (if targeting a non-U.S. person). The Act created the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) and enabled it to oversee requests for surveillance warrants by federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies (primarily

3904-485: Was amended in 2001 by the USA PATRIOT Act , primarily to include terrorism on behalf of groups that are not specifically backed by a foreign government. In 2004, FISA was amended to include a "lone wolf" provision. 50 U.S.C.   § 1801(b)(1)(C) . A "lone wolf" is a non-U.S. person who engages in or prepares for international terrorism. The provision amended the definition of "foreign power" to permit

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3968-476: Was created to provide judicial and congressional oversight of the government's covert surveillance activities of foreign entities and individuals in the United States, while maintaining the secrecy needed to protect national security. FISA came into public prominence in December 2005 following an article in The New York Times that described a program of warrantless domestic wiretapping ordered by

4032-535: Was developed between 1982 and 1985 by Eugene Miya of NASA for the SPACE mailing list. The format was then picked up on other mailing lists and Usenet newsgroups . Posting frequency changed to monthly, and finally weekly and daily across a variety of mailing lists and newsgroups. The first person to post a weekly FAQ was Jef Poskanzer to the Usenet net.graphics / comp.graphics newsgroups . Eugene Miya experimented with

4096-468: Was required in order for the domestic surveillance to satisfy the Fourth Amendment. Justice Powell wrote that the decision did not address this issue that "may be involved with respect to activities of foreign powers or their agents". Immediately preceding FISA, a number of courts squarely addressed the issue of "warrantless wiretaps". In both United States v. Brown , 484 F.2d 418 (5th Cir. 1973), and United States v. Butenko , 494 F.2d 593 (3rd Cir. 1974),

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