WASHINGTON — A Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court judge informed the Senate Monday that no telephone service provider has ever protested a request from the court for all customer records under section 215 of the Patriot Act.
The 11-page letter from FISA court Judge Reggie Walton to Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick Leahy answered questions raised by the committee over the controversial top-secret surveillance programs leaked by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden earlier this summer.
In the letter, Walton outlined several opportunities for the companies to challenge a court order for surveillance information, including refusal to comply (after which the court will hold a hearing, giving the party a chance to voice their complaint) and filing a petition challenging the order.
The same statute additionally allows recipients of information requests to challenge the non-disclosure orders that frequently go along with these requests — meaning if a company successfully filed one, it could reveal to the public the information the government requested from them.
“To date, no recipient of a production order has opted to invoke this section of the statute,” Walton said.
Companies including Verizon, Google, Microsoft, Facebook and Yahoo complained loudly after the programs were unveiled to the public, and that they would fight any government mandate for sweeping customer information in the interest of their consumer’s rights to privacy.
But statements from those service providers all used similar language, acknowledging that they do process federal subpoenas requesting specific information. In an internal email to employees, Verizon said were the company to “receive such an order,” it would be “required to comply.”
The revealed surveillance programs now under congressional investigation found their legal justification in section 215 of the Patriot Act, which in broad terms allows the government to collect information held by businesses if it could be deemed relevant to counter-terrorism investigations.
That information reportedly includes the telephone and Internet metadata tracking individual phone call party records, their locations, Web search use and email services provided by the previously mentioned companies.
Only since the programs leaked have any companies petitioned the FISA Court to declassify their prior requests for information and user data.