'Snoopgate' tracked domestic calls too

Agencies / Dec 22, 2005, 00:11 IST

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A surveillance programme approved by US president Bush to conduct eavesdropping without warrants has captured domestic communications on foreign soil.

WASHINGTON: A surveillance programme approved by US president Bush to conduct eavesdropping without warrants has captured what are purely domestic communications in some cases, despite a requirement by the White House that one end of the intercepted conversations take place on foreign soil, officials say.
The officials say the National Security Agency's interception of a small number of communications between people within the US was apparently accidental, and was caused by technical glitches at the National Security Agency in determining if a communication was in fact "international."
Telecommunications experts say the issue points up troubling logistical questions about the program.
At a time when communications networks are increasingly globalised, it is sometimes difficult even for the NSA to determine whether someone is inside or outside the US when making a cellphone call or sending an e-mail message.

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As a result, people that the security agency may think are outside the US are actually on American soil.
In at least one instance, someone using an international cellphone was thought to be outside the US when in fact both people in the conversation were in the country.
Officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity, would not discuss the number of intercepts, but the total is thought to represent a very small fraction of the total number of wiretaps that Bush has authorised without getting warrants.
In all, officials say the programme has been used to eavesdrop on as many as 500 people at any one time, with the total number of people reaching perhaps into the thousands in the last three years.

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