AT&T Sued Over NSA Surveillance

Wired News: AT&T Sued Over NSA Eavesdropping. This story looks at the Electronic Frontier Foundation law suit against AT&T (PDF) claiming they allowed illegal NSA access to the massive phone company database of all calls made by phone and long distance customers of AT&T and apparently all internet addresses visited through AT&T internet services since 2001, according to a December 26, 2005 LA Times story.

The shocker here is that phone companies store this type of data in massive databases and that they have their own data mining systems to root through that huge haystack of information. What possible need could there be to keep stacking that hay continuously?

The lawsuit seeks up to $22,000 in damages to be paid to every party who were AT&T customers since the illegal surveillance was implemented in 2001. Although that payout is extremely unlikely as it is expected that the National Security Agency (NSA) will invoke the State Secrets privilege to kill the case. The state secrets privilege has been used successfully in every case it has been applied to. That law provides a back door for escape for the NSA and AT&T in this suit.

Expect to see the case dropped soon. But it has been confirmed that the domestic spying and warrantless wiretaps are a reality. This scandal is likely to be swept under the rug, but the lawsuit and the reporting by both the New York and Los Angeles Times will definitely throttle the expansion of domestic spying and illegal surveillance by NSA spooks.

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