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The collection of telephone metadata by United States intelligence services “exceeds the scope of what Congress has authorized,” a federal appeals court has ruled in a major blow to the National Security Agency.

 

On Thursday, the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit said the American Civil Liberties Union can sue the director of national intelligence over the NSA’s bulk collection program, reversing a ruling handed down more than a year earlier.

A district court judge had previously dismissed a lawsuit filed by the ACLU in June 2013 less than a week after documents leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden revealed that the agency has regularly collected records of phone calls pertaining to millions of Americans. The ACLU appealedthat ruling in January 2014 and its suit has been remanded back to the district court upon this week’s decision.

Contrary to the government’s earlier arguments, the appeals court said that the metadata collection program exposed by Snowden isn’t allowable under Section 215 of the Patriot Act.

“We conclude that the district court erred in ruling that § 215 authorizes the telephone metadata collection program, and instead hold that the telephone metadata program exceeds the scope of what Congress has authorized and therefore violates,” the three-person appeals panel unanimously ruled.

 

Read more: http://rt.com/usa/256557-nsa-telephone-spy-unconstitutional/