Obama Reportedly To Call For End of Govt. Control of Phone Data

A senior Obama administration
official has told the Associated Press that the president will call
for the end of government control of American phone data in a
speech today. However, the unnamed official also told the AP
that,

Obama will not recommend who should control the phone data and
will instead call on the attorney general, intelligence community
and Congress to make that determination.

How reassuring.

The presidential NSA review panel made 46
recommendations, including that phone companies hold onto the
metadata records currently held by the NSA.

Unsurprisingly, the panel was reportedly “concerned about the
possibility of future privacy abuses by the government if that data
remained with a government agency.”

The AP also reports that Obama is expected to announce changes
to how the NSA spies on foreigners:

The president also was expected to announce changes in U.S.
surveillance operations overseas, including ratcheting up oversight
to determine whether the government will monitor communications of
friendly foreign leaders. It’s unclear whether there will be any
changes to how the government access or holds communications
records collected from foreigners living overseas.

Interestingly, Obama’s speech will be given fifty-three years to
the day after President Eisenhower warned of the “unwarranted
influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial
complex” in his farwell address. 

Obama’s speech is scheduled to begin at 11am ET.