20140125 Datenschutzkommission: Telefonüberwachung illegal

Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board sees no help by communication data in counterterrorism investigation

A 238 pages report of the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board (PCLOB), a commission for privacy and civil rights, states that the communication data stored by the NSA in no case were necessery for counterterrorism investigations.

Looking in the NSA reports about a list of fifty-four counterterrorism events in which Section 215 or Section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act of 2008 “contributed to a success story” PCLOB stated: "We have examined those incidents in depth, attempting to discern precisely what was accomplished in each case through the use of Section 215 records and whether similar results could have been achieved using more tailored means of gathering telephone records. (…)

Based on the information provided to the Board, we have not identified a single instance involving a threat to the United States in which the telephone records program made a concrete difference in the outcome of a counterterrorism investigation. Moreover, we are aware of no instance in which the program directly contributed to the discovery of a previously unknown terrorist plot or the disruption of a terrorist attack. And we believe that in only one instance over the past seven years has the program arguably contributed to the identification of an unknown terrorism suspect. In that case, moreover, the suspect was not involved in planning a terrorist attack and there is reason to believe that the FBI may have discovered him without the contribution of the NSA’s program."