NSA’s Bulk Collection of Telephone Data Is Ruled Illegal
The court declines to rule on whether the practice violates the U.S Constitution.
The seals of the U.S. Cyber Command, the National Secrity Agency and the Central Security Service greet employees and visitors at the campus the three organizations share March 13, 2015 in Fort Meade, Maryland.
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The National Security Agency’s bulk collection of phone data isn’t legal, a federal appeals court said just weeks before the law the government used to justify the program is set to expire.
A three-judge panel in New York held Thursday that the program goes beyond the authority granted by the Patriot Act, a law passed after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks that expanded government surveillance and data collection. A lower-court judge had said the program is legal.