Court judges that NSA is secretly collecting phone metadata is illegal

In 2013, the US National Security Agency (NSA) was collecting metadata such as the phone number of the caller and the other party of the call, the time of the call, the length of the call through eavesdropping in order to obtain evidence in criminal investigations. It was revealed by a whistleblower by Edward Snowden . Seven years later, in September 2020, NSA's metadata collection was first recognized as illegal.

9th Circuit Opinion Sept 2 14-50051_Documents
https://beta.documentcloud.org/documents/20386796-9th-circuit-opinion-sept-2-14-50051_documents

Appeals court rules NSA's bulk phone data collection illegal | The Hill
https://thehill.com/policy/national-security/514854-court-rules-nsas-bulk-phone-data-collection-illegal

Court rules NSA phone snooping illegal — after 7-year delay-POLITICO
https://www.politico.com/news/2020/09/02/court-rules-nsa-phone-snooping-illegal-407727

In 2013, Edward Snowden , a former member of the National Security Agency (NSA) and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), revealed the existence of NSA's confidential surveillance program, PRISM .

PRISM was established during the time of President George W. Bush after the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Companies generally provide information in accordance with the law when the government issues a disclosure order regarding user personal information, but this method takes time. It is this PRISM that allows the NSA and FBI to refer to information without a warrant or the consent of the company.

The data that can be collected by PRISM is wide variety such as email, live chat, text, video, music, communication log, and it is also possible to directly access the server of Internet related companies such as Google, Apple, Yahoo!, Facebook, Microsoft to collect information. It is possible.

What is PRISM, a confidential system that allows you to directly peek at personal information on servers such as Google, Apple, and Yahoo!? -GIGAZINE

Seven years after the information was exposed, Wednesday, September 2, 2020, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit determined that the NSA's data collection was illegal and unconstitutional. The trial was about the charges of Bassary Said Morin, who had been charged with three conspirators for funding Somali militant group Al Shabab . Morin was convicted of money laundering and terrorist financing in 2013.

The NSA claims that the arrests of the three were credited with collecting sensitive data from PRISM. However, a panel of three judges concludes that a program that can pull out detailed information from billions of Americans' phones violates the Foreign Information Surveillance Act and violates the bill of rights that sets warrants. I attached it.

Judges also ignored the 2013 trial, 'the fact that by collecting and analyzing the metadata of millions of people's phones, we revealed Morin's defendant's metadata collection.' Pointed out that there is. On top of that, he said that the NSA's 'features' are 'the role that the phone's metadata played is trivial compared to the call records the government took in a legitimate way.'

The trial, in which PRISM was found to be illegal, has great significance, and the American Free Human Rights Association commented on the decision as 'a victory for our right to privacy.' 'It's a shame that the court did not allow the removal of the illegally gathered evidence, despite the fact that it was observed in Morin's case,' he said.

NSA's metadata collection activities were discontinued in 2015.