"In mid 2011, NSA notified the DOJ, the DNI, and the FISA court, and House and Senate Intelligence Committees, of a series of compliance incidents impacting a subset of NSA collection under Section 702 of FISA, known as upstream collection. This comprises about 10 percent of all collection that takes place under 702, and occurs when NSA obtains Internet communications, such as e-mails, from certain U.S. companies that operate the Internet background;[sic] i.e., the companies that own and operate the domestic telecommu"
"But the government itself released the October 3, 2011 John Bates FISC opinion (and other related documents) which describes the government's collection of Internet transactions directly from the phone company switches (see footnote 24 where Bates distinguishes between the two kinds of Section 702 Internet collection). In an attempt to spin this collection as a big mistake last week, Dianne Feinstein even confirmed that this "upstream" collection comes from the backbone operated by the phone companies."
General Keith Alexander claimed that PRISM was essentially the only program operating under FISA Section 702, while noting additional programs under sections 703, 704 and 705. PRISM collects Internet content from participating service providers, but other 702 collection occurs upstream from backbone infrastructure and phone company switches. The October 3, 2011 John Bates FISC opinion and related documents describe collection of Internet transactions directly from phone company switches and distinguish two kinds of Section 702 Internet collection. Upstream collection comprises about ten percent of 702 collection. Senator Dianne Feinstein confirmed that upstream collection comes from phone company-operated backbone networks.
Read at Emptywheel
Unable to calculate read time
Collection
[
|
...
]