Security News > 2020 > February > After blowing $100m to snoop on Americans' phone call logs for four years, what did the NSA get? Just one lead

The controversial surveillance program that gave the NSA access to the phone call records of millions of Americans has cost US taxpayers $100m - and resulted in just one useful lead over four years.

It is perhaps no wonder that the NSA and the FBI has spent years stalling and refusing to hand over any information about the program.

The Trump Administration has asked that Congress extend the law so the NSA can, if it wishes, turn the program back on at some future date.

The lengthy report is a welcome return for the PCLOB, which was turned into a zombie organization unable to do any work for several years after its previous report on NSA spying programs concluded that they were illegal and Congress was obliged to scale them back.

Not to be beaten, several senators are again trying to scale back the various NSA surveillance programs, announcing a new bill last month aimed at ending NSA blanket snooping, protecting abuse of the FISA oversight process, closing various loopholes in the secret law that the spying agency uses, and expanding scrutiny of the programs.

News URL

https://go.theregister.co.uk/feed/www.theregister.co.uk/2020/02/26/nsa_calllogging_program/