What is the Secret Memo that Gives Obama’s FBI Access to Phone Records without Court Approval?

[The Straight Story]

What is the Secret Memo that Gives Obama’s FBI Access to Phone Records without Court Approval?

A government watchdog group has sued the Department of Justice to force the release of a secret memo used by the FBI to access any American telephone records without court approval.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) filed its civil case after the Justice Department refused to fulfill a Freedom of Information Act request seeking a copy of the memo that was drafted by the Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) on January 8, 2010.

EFF says the existence of the document was revealed by the Justice Department’s inspector general (IG) in a report discussing how the FBI has defended its warrantless snooping into phone records, which EFF says constitutes a violation of the Electronic Privacy Communications Act of 1986.

The IG report was heavily redacted, according to EFF, and the inspector general expressed “grave concerns” about the FBI’s interpretation of the law, which allows the FBI “to seek and obtain certain types of telephone records on a voluntary basis from providers without legal process of a qualifying emergency.”

http://www.allgov.com/Controversies/ViewNews/What_is_the_Secret_Memo_that_Gives_Obamas_FBI_Access_to_Phone_Records_without_Court_Approval_110524

[xchrom]

1. Recommend

[DirkGently]

2. Interesting.

[leveymg]

3. FBI has been issuing thousands of "administrative subpoenas" for phone and ISP records.

This should not come as a surprise to anyone.