Fergie's Tech Blog

Carriers Try To Avoid The Warrantless Eavesdropping Spotlight

Richard Martin writes on InformationWeek:

As Congress pushes forward in its effort to bring some visibility to the Bush Administration's warrantless-wiretapping program, the nation's major telecom companies find themselves in increasing danger of having their own role in the program exposed in court.

Last week both the U.S. House and Senate pushed forward versions of the bill renewing the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) that would not include so-called "retroactive immunity" for the carriers who acceded to White House demands for customer records of phone calls and Web-surfing activities -- usually without warrants or subpoenas -- in the last few years. President Bush has repeatedly stated that he will not sign a FISA renewal that does not provide the large telecoms with legal cover.

posted by Fergie @ 11/19/2007 05:56:00 PM