Bush faces protest over phone spying(1986 Stored Communications Act)

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US PRESIDENT George W Bush today moved to quell a firestorm over his government's secret collection of telephone records of tens of millions of private citizens, insisting they were all needed to "target al-Qaeda". But the latest controversy has already spawned a major lawsuit against Verizon, one of the telephone companies involved, and members of Congress expressed unease over what they see as gradual erosion of privacy rights.

The lawsuit, filed in New York yesterday, seeks from Verizon $US5 billion ($A6.46 billion) in damages, alleging the company broke the law by agreeing to provide the National Security Agency with telephone records of its clients.
The plaintiffs argue phone companies should not cooperate with the NSA, which specialises in electronic espionage, without a proper court warrant based on well-grounded "suspicion of terrorist activity or other criminal activity".

But in his weekly radio address, Bush rushed to assure the public the secret program did not target innocent private citizens. "It is important for Americans to understand that our activities strictly target al-Qaeda and its known affiliates," he said. But he gave no answer to questions raised on Capitol Hill as to why a program with a purported narrow target would need such a massive database.

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The new controversy follows charges the president may have broken the law when he authorised the NSA in the wake of 9/11 to conduct wiretaps of international phone calls made by Americans suspected of terrorist ties without a requisite court warrant. But if the wiretaps put the White House on the spot, the new revelations could mean a world of legal and financial trouble for the phone companies. The lawsuit in New York was filed under the 1986 Stored Communications Act, which expressly forbids the companies from turning over client records to the government without a warrant. The statute also gives consumers the right to sue for violations of the act and allows claims of at least $US1,000 ($A1,290) for each violation.

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,19130869-1702,00.html