President Obama has long since pledged to have the most transparent administration in United States history and to his credit has implemented a number of measures to fulfill this promise. One such measure is known as the USA Freedom Act – passed in 2013. This act requires Federal agencies such as the CIA and NSA to release “certain business records, conduct electronic surveillance, use pen registers and trap and trace devices, and use other forms of information” directly gathered as a result of “foreign intelligence, counter-terrorism, and criminal” investigations.
In accordance with the Freedom Act, on May 2nd the U.S. Intelligence Community released their annual transparency report. Before we get into the results of the report it is important to cover a few basics. First, it is important to note these orders are related to the US Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which we have described in detail for a previous article. Second, if you read through the report you will see it specifically reference something known as Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act several times. This is essentially the clause which regulates federal surveillance requests. The last thing you should know is that the The U.S. Intelligence Community consists of a collection of 17 different federal organizations, most notably the FBI, CIA and NSA.
The report itself divides the number of people targeted by nationality, those inside the USA and those outside. As the “F” in FISC refers to “foreign”, naturally the largest figures in this report correlate to foreign citizens. However, as Jenna McLaughlin of The Intercept wrote, the number of searches conducted on American citizens on behalf of this court has doubled in the last two years, ballooning to “4,672 — more than double the 2013 figure.”
As for those of you living outside the United States, the figures are intentionally difficult to navigate but the numbers are much more profound. According to the official statistics, Titles I & III and Sections 703 & 704 produced 1,695 targets. Section 702 produced 94,368 targets. Title IV produced 456 targets and the FISC courts approved National Security Letters for 48,642 individuals. Additionally the report indicates that the US government received electronic information on 134,987 persons/targets directly from their service providers.
These numbers are to be taken with a grain of salt because these are the statistics the federal government is willing to release. Likely these targets are individuals who were investigated and posed little to no threat. I say this because one of the agencies within the US Intelligence Community is the NSA and the NSA’s most extensive/comprehensive program is known as PRISM. The number of people spied upon under this program are shielded under “national security” and the exact number of individuals involved is classified – even United States Congress doesn’t know these figures. This means the number of targets both domestic and international are far above and beyond the statistics released in this report.
So what exactly is a target? According to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the term “target is defined as the individual person, group, entity comprised of multiple individuals, or foreign power that uses the selector, such as a telephone number or email address.” Yes, you read that right. By by the simple act of having a phone number or email you qualify yourself as being a potential target of the United States government. Seriously you cant make this stuff up.
To be fair the US Intelligence Community says they limit their targets to a “person, group, or entity reasonably believed to be located outside the United States and who possesses, or who is likely to communicate or receive, foreign intelligence information.” But as many of these targets are “unintentionally acquired” as a result of the NSA’s PRISM Program, there is no true definition or guideline in existence.
Source: Office of The Director of National Intelligence
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