[Infowarrior] - FISA court judge: No company has ever challenged Patriot Act sharing

[Richard Forno]

FISA court judge: No company has ever challenged Patriot Act sharing

Also: Court staff helps gov't lawyers make their applications more palatable.

by Cyrus Farivar - July 30 2013, 12:59pm EDT

According to one of the 11 judges that sits on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC), no corporation ever served with a “business record” court order under the Patriot Act has ever challenged one, even though the law provides them a means to do so.

In other words, when the government asked Verizon to hand over call records and other metadata to the National Security Agency (NSA), the company did so without so much as a peep. Earlier this month, the Electronic Privacy Information Center filed an emergency petition to the Supreme Court to halt the entire metadata sharing program.

In a new 11-page letter published Monday from FISC Presiding Judge Reggie B. Walton to Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT), the judge writes, “To date no recipient of a production order has opted to invoke this section of the statute.” (Leahy is set to hold a senatorial hearing on government surveillance program this week.)

< - >

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/07/fisa-court-judge-no-company-has-ever-challenged-patriot-act-sharing/


---
Just because i'm near the punchbowl doesn't mean I'm also drinking from it.