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N.S.A. Halts Collection of Americans' Emails About Foreign Targets

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The rest are fair game.

WASHINGTON — The National Security Agency said Friday that it 
had halted one of the most disputed practices of its warrantless 
surveillance program, ending a once-secret form of wiretapping 
that dates to the Bush administration’s post-Sept. 11 expansion 
of national security powers.

The agency is no longer collecting Americans’ emails and texts 
exchanged with people overseas that simply mention identifying 
terms — like email addresses — for foreigners whom the agency is 
spying on, but are neither to nor from those targets.

The decision is a major development in American surveillance 
policy. Privacy advocates have argued that the practice skirted 
or overstepped the Fourth Amendment.

The change is unrelated to the surveillance imbroglio over the 
investigations into Russia and the Trump campaign, according to 
officials familiar with the matter. Rather, it stemmed from a 
discovery last year that N.S.A. analysts had violated rules 
imposed by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to limit 
access to certain messages the agency captured as a byproduct of 
the practice.

Senator Ron Wyden, an Oregon Democrat who sits on the 
Intelligence Committee and has long been an outspoken critic of 
what he saw as N.S.A. overreach, hailed the decision and said he 
would offer legislation to codify the new limit in federal law.

“This change ends a practice that allowed Americans’ 
communications to be collected without a warrant merely for 
mentioning a foreign target,” Mr. Wyden said. “For years, I’ve 
repeatedly raised concerns that this amounted to an end run 
around the Fourth Amendment. This transparency should be 
commended.”

The government had argued that the practice was important for 
fighting terrorism, saying it could uncover new suspects it 
might otherwise never find.

The legal issue behind the N.S.A.’s decision, first reported 
Friday by The New York Times and later acknowledged by the 
agency, is rooted in the complicated technical steps the agency 
takes to conduct surveillance.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/28/us/politics/nsa-surveillance-
terrorism-privacy.html?_r=0

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N.S.A. Halts Collection of Americans' Emails About Foreign Targets "Thanks Obama..." <obama@treason.com> - 2017-04-29 15:29 +0000
  Re: N.S.A. Halts Collection of Americans' Emails About Foreign Targets JoeyDee <joedid@outlook.com> - 2017-04-29 12:44 -0400
  Re: N.S.A. Halts Collection of Americans' Emails About Foreign Targets - Which was started by George Bush Nomen Nescio <nobody@dizum.com> - 2017-04-29 19:16 +0200
  Re: N.S.A. Halts Collection of Americans' Emails About Foreign Targets burfordTjustice <burfordTjustice@tues.uk> - 2017-04-29 14:26 -0400
    Re: N.S.A. Halts Collection of Americans' Emails About Foreign Targets PAS <abc@doremi.net> - 2017-05-01 11:52 -0400
      Re: N.S.A. Halts Collection of Americans' Emails About Foreign Targets Cornelis Tromp <nobody@holland.remailer.nl> - 2017-05-01 20:02 +0100

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