NSA snooping didn't make America much safer, report says
President Obama has said controversial NSA data-collection programs helped America avert dozens of threats. But the data suggest the programs' impact was minimal, a report says.
White House press secretary Jay Carney speaks about topics including the NSA and intelligence gathering reforms during his daily news briefing at the White House in Washington Friday.
Jacquelyn Martin/AP
Washington
A new analysis by a nonpartisan think tank claims that President Obama鈥檚 justification for the National Security Agency鈥檚 controversial bulk collection of e-mails and phone data 鈥� that it makes America safer 鈥� is 鈥渙verblown and even misleading.鈥�
Mr. Obama has said that 鈥渁t least 50 threats鈥� have been averted by the surveillance program. But the New America Foundation cast doubt on that assertion in an analysis released Monday of 225 cases since 9/11 in which operatives recruited by Al Qaeda or an Al Qaeda-affiliated group were charged with an act of terrorism.
The report finds that 鈥渢raditional investigative methods, such as the use of informants, tips from local communities, and targeted intelligence operations, provided the initial impetus for investigations in the majority of cases, while the contribution of NSA鈥檚 bulk surveillance programs to these cases was minimal.鈥�
The investigation found that the American telephone metadata, which includes the phone numbers that originate and receive calls, as well as the time and date of those calls but not their content, 鈥渁ppears to have played an identifiable role in initiating, at most, 1.8 percent of these cases.鈥�
This conclusion seems echoes one by the White House review panel commissioned by Mr. Obama in its report released Dec. 18. It found that 鈥渢he information contributed to terrorist investigations by the use of section 215 telephony meta-data was not essential to preventing attacks.鈥�
Indeed, the report argues that greater concern for US counterterrorism officials 鈥渋s not that they need vaster amounts of information from the bulk surveillance programs, but that they don鈥檛 sufficiently understand or widely share the information they already possess that was derived from conventional law enforcement and intelligence techniques.鈥�
Some lawmakers jumped on the findings. 鈥淭he impact of that [metadata collection] program has been modest, I think, is fair to say,鈥� Rep. Adam Schiff (D) of California, a member of the House Intelligence Committee, told MSNBC. 鈥淎nd I don鈥檛 think anyone can make the case it鈥檚 much more than that,鈥� he added.
鈥淚t can鈥檛 justify the gathering of these millions of records when it can be done another way where the government doesn鈥檛 have to obtain all of that information.鈥�
Obama is expected to announce reforms to NSA intelligence-gathering activities Friday. The aim, US officials say, will be to balance the calls for closer attention to American civil liberties with national security.聽
Representative Schiff added that Congress would likely be a bystander to many of these reforms, which the president will likely be able to enact through executive order.