ACLU sues government for data on e-spying law

Civil liberties groups filed a lawsuit against the federal government on Thursday seeking the release of documents showing how a controversial electronic spying law is being implemented and whether the communications of U.S. citizens are being monitored improperly.

Congress passed the law in 2008 to rewrite the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act after the government disclosed that it had been using warrantless wiretaps dating back to 2001. The lawsuit was filed in New York by the American Civil Liberties Union and New York Civil Liberties Union against the office of the director of national intelligence, Justice Department, National Security Agency and Defense Department.

"Despite being in operation for nearly two years, the American public is largely in the dark about how the controversial FISA Amendments Act has been implemented in practice," said Melissa Goodman, staff attorney with the ACLU's National Security Project. "The public has a right to know how the government is using, and possibly abusing, an intrusive surveillance power that implicates the privacy and speech rights of all U.S. citizens and residents."

Under the law, the government does not need warrants to monitor the communications of foreigners that pass through or are stored by U.S. communications hubs. The government also does not need warrants to monitor the communications of U.S. citizens who come into contact with foreign terrorist suspects, as long as that citizen is not the target of surveillance and his or her communications are minimized. Individual warrants are still needed if the target of surveillance is a U.S. citizen or an American traveling abroad.

The law also created a process to give telecommunications companies immunity for helping the government with warrantless wiretapping.

The lawsuit seeks to enforce a November 2009 Freedom of Information Act request for records related to the government's interpretation and implementation of the law and what safeguards are in place to prevent abuses, the ACLU said.

"The government has not yet released any of the records requested, and today's lawsuit asks a federal judge to order it to do so," the ACLU added. "The lawsuit alleges that the requested records are needed to enable informed public debate about whether the [law] -- which expires in 2012 -- should be repealed, amended or extended."