NSA bill stalls in Senate
The Senate on Tuesday failed to get the 60 votes needed to advance a bill that would stop the National Security Agency from collecting the phone records of millions of Americans who are not suspected of any crime. The bill is effectively dead for this year and is unlikely to be revived when the new Congress convenes in January. However, the controversial NSA program will most likely be debated again next year as Congress decides whether to renew sections of the Patriot Act anti-terrorism law that are set to expire in June. Ref. USAToday
Wikimedia v. NSA: Challenge to Mass Surveillance Under the FISA Amendments Act:
The ACLU has filed a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the NSA's mass interception and searching of Americans' international communications. At issue is the NSA's "Upstream" Surveillance, through which the U.S. Government monitors almost all international - and many domestic - text-based communications. Ref. Source 1
Two men tried to ram the main gate at the headquarters of the National Security Agency at Fort Meade, Maryland today, according to a federal law enforcement official. An NSA police officer shot one of the men dead and seriously injured the second.
The incident took place near one of the gates to the complex, far from the main buildings.
In addition to the headquarters of the NSA, Fort Meade is home to 95 units from all branches of the armed forces and offices that report to several Defense Department agencies, according to the U.S. Army, which operates the base.
About 11,000 military employees and 29,000 civilians work there, according to the Army. Ref. CNN
A federal appeals court ruled that the National Security Agency's mass collection of Americans' phone records, first revealed by Edward Snowden, is not legal under the Patriot Act.
The court said it wouldn't block the collection while the case, which was brought by the ACLU, is reconsidered at a lower court. Ref. CNN