WASHINGTON-Even with carefully worded denials by two large telephone companies and outright denials by two national mobile-phone carriers, the Bush administration and the telecom industry last week failed to quell a mushrooming controversy over whether carriers supplied the National Security Agency with millions of phone-call records as part of its now-acknowledged terrorist surveillance program. In fact, it got worse.
Verizon Communications Inc., AT&T Inc. and BellSouth Corp.-the three companies reported to be cooperating with NSA in phone-call data mining-have been slapped with privacy lawsuits. Last Thursday, Sprint Nextel Corp. was dragged into litigation.
AT&T, which has not disavowed an association with the NSA, found itself in perhaps the hottest seat of all. Last Wednesday, a U.S. District Court judge in San Francisco ruled the Electronic Frontier Foundation can use critical evidence-three documents purportedly spelling out in detail AT&T’s participation in NSA’s surveillance program-in the watchdog group’s class-action suit against AT&T.
Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden, who designed and oversaw the Bush-approved surveillance program as NSA head between 1999 and 2005, was grilled by Democratic members of the Senate Intelligence Committee during his confirmation hearing on his nomination to head the CIA.
Hayden vigorously defended the eavesdropping component of the surveillance program, but would neither confirm nor deny whether the NSA got access to millions of call records in hopes of detecting patterns of any terrorist activity. Likewise, President Bush has acknowledged NSA listening to calls where al Qaeda is suspected of calling into the United States, but has not disavowed the May 11 USA Today report that the NSA also is collecting and analyzing call records of U.S. citizens.
The controversy found its way to the Federal Communications Commission, with a Democratic member of the agency, a prominent House lawmaker and privacy group calling for an investigation into whether laws protecting privacy of telecom subscribers have been violated.
“The revelation that several telecommunications carriers are complicit in the NSA’s once-secret program, raises the question as to whether these carriers are in violation of Section 222 of the Communications Act and the commission’s regulations implementing that section. As you know, one of the principal purposes of Section 222 is to safeguard the privacy of telecommunications consumers. I am aware of no exception in that statute or in the commission’s regulations for intelligence gathering purposes, or any other similar purpose, that would permit the wholesale disclosure of consumer records,” said Rep. Edward Markey (Mass.), ranking Democrat on the House telecom and Internet subcommittee, in a letter to FCC Chairman Kevin Martin.
Markey, co-chair of the bipartisan House privacy caucus, asked that Martin respond by today. “The Bush administration says this program of sweeping up phone call data of tens of millions of Americans who have nothing to do with al Qaeda is `narrowly defined,’ but it appears this electronic driftnet over our homes is only `narrowly described,”‘ Markey said.
“We are reviewing [Markey’s letter] carefully and will respond accordingly,” said David Fiske, an FCC spokesman.
Markey said he and other Democrats on the House Commerce Committee last week sent a letter to Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas), chairman of the panel, requesting hearings on alleged cooperation of telecom carriers with NSA. A House Commerce Committee spokesman said no such hearing has been scheduled.
USA Today, citing sources familiar with arrangements between NSA and phone companies, reported AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth contributed phone calling data to the security agency.
BellSouth has taken issue with the USA Today article. “Based on our review to date, we have confirmed no such contract exists and we have not provided bulk customer calling records to the NSA,” BellSouth said in a statement.
RCR Wireless News previously reported T-Mobile USA Inc. and Verizon Wireless said they did not participate in any NSA phone record collection program, while Cingular Wireless L.L.C., owned by AT&T and BellSouth, and Sprint Nextel have denied comment. Qwest Communications International Inc., which resells wireless service using Sprint Nextel’s CDMA network, reportedly balked at NSA’s request for customers’ call records. A Qwest spokesman said the company does not comment on national security matters.
FCC Commissioner Michael Copps called on his agency to examine whether telecom carriers may have violated laws protecting subscribers’ privacy.
“There is no doubt that protecting the security of the American people is our government’s No. 1 responsibility. But in a digital age where collecting, distributing, and manipulating consumers’ personal information is as easy as a click of a button, the privacy of our citizens must still matter,” said Copps.
The FCC declined to comment on Copps’ request.
The Electronic Privacy Information Center also filed a complaint with the FCC, requesting a probe of whether telecom service providers are violating subscribers’ privacy.
In remarks last Monday at the Woodrow Wilson Center, Sen. John Sununu (R-N.H.) said he is leery about big government surveillance programs, but added he does not blame telecom carriers for cooperating with NSA requests for phone records.
In February, Sens. Russell Feingold (D-Wis.) and Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) wrote to executives of AT&T, Sprint Nextel and Verizon to ask about their alleged involvement with the NSA’s warrantless eavesdropping program. However, it remains unclear what, if anything, the telecom companies told the lawmakers.
President Bush, asked by a reporter last Tuesday about reported phone-call data mining at NSA, refused to confirm or deny the program’s existence.
“What I have told the American people is, we’ll protect them against an al Qaeda attack, and we’ll do so within the law. I’ve been very clear about the principles and guidelines of any program that has been designed to protect the American people,” said Bush. “I’ve also been clear about the fact that we do not listen to domestic phone calls without court approval, and that this government will continue to guard the privacy of the American people. But if al Qaeda is calling into the United States, we want to know, and we want to know why.”
