From The Switch blog at Washington Post: After a legal battle that went on over a year, the federal government was forced to reveal a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act Court (FISC) opinion that showed the National Security Agency (NSA) engaged in unconstitutional surveillance practices, including the collection of tens of thousands of Americans’ online communications.
The Switch talked to Mark Rumold, a staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) who worked on the case, hours after the opinion was released Wednesday night. This interview has been lightly edited for clarity and length.
[…]
Andrea Peterson: Can you walk me through the basic timeline and the government’s reaction to the FOIA suit?
Mark Rumold: We filed suit in August 2012 and essentially the government dragged their heels. They dragged their heels for the entire period that the [FISA Amendments Act] was up for reauthorization and the entire period that the opinion itself could have provided useful information for the public and for Congress to debate whether the FFA should be reauthorized.
Kind of shockingly, during the entire debate they withheld the opinion, they withheld all records …
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