big brother times three. Government whether on any level is not being held accountable and is out of control- their arrogance is mind boggling

Having the intelligence community monitoring phone calls is very disturing and a direct violation of the constitution. What is even scarier, is who is doing the monitoring. It's not just the NSA, NRO, DIA etc... Look who is working for these govt agecies. There's been a lot of outsourcing of intelligence jobs. Pls take a look the web page for SAIC and check out the job posting. Lot's of jobs requiring SAP clearance and contracted to the NSA, DIA, etc.. What it comes down to is our govt has outsouced intel gathering to corporate America. Very very scary.

Also they say their only looking at call patterns. Witht the high level use if statistical analysis and just bits and pieces of converstations, they call tell a heck of lot about a person.

Robert Calandriello

Good! I hope they do find out who is leaking national security info to the press. I'm tired of the press helping our enemies. Maybe you guys should start trying to "FOR the USA" instead of "AGAINST the USA" ALL THE TIME. I hope the FBI nails lots of idiots who are out to destroy the intelligence agencies and cost us more soldiers and spys!

'Bout time you guys are roped in.

Excellent the Media needs looking after, Traitors most of them.......

good, you seditionist creeps deserve what you get. who knows how many serviceman have died because of your "right to know"

I hope the information they gain allows them to catch the scum that leak information, and helps them arrest the communist scum who publish it.

'Bout time you guys are roped in.

well maybe ABC news better stop leaking classified information. This only helps our enemies and right now I believe ABC news is an enemy of the US.

You didn't inconvenience someone, you broke the law. It's called a criminal investigation!!!!

I believe that it is a great idea to maintain telephone surveilance over news organizations who disclose classified and sensitive secret information. Lets nail the government employees who knowingly break their oath to not divulge classified information.

GOOD! I hope they find out who is reporting all of these leaks. And I hope you are tried and perhaps spend some time in jail for it.
KEEP CALLING and I hope they track your every word!

"Under Bush Administration guidelines, it is not considered illegal for the government to keep track of numbers dialed by phone customers."

Under the law as signed by Bill Clinton collecting the information is legal. Why do you portray it as "under Bush administration guidelines?" Is this part of the bias I hear so much about?

If they are investigating leaks they probably have warrants for the searches so they can see who is leaking information. I am glad they are rooting out the people breaking the law. I hope they get the one who broke the law by telling you about this.

Anyone who doesn't believe this is just the tip of the NSA domestic spying iceberg is either naive or foolish. The first thing that crossed my mind when USAToday broke the story about a database full of purely domestic call records was that the Bush regime would be using it to keep track of every journalist and blogger. Just another step taken by this administration to suppress dissent and just another step towards stifling freedom of speech and freedom of the press. Maybe now the MSM will finally wake up and start reporting the facts about this administration instead of trying to remain neutral.

This might be one of the most frightening things I've ever read.

Anonymous sources will never be credible. It seems that the media tends to quote a "source" but won't name them. If you feel strongly about something, have the courage and conviction to stand up and be named. Another reason why I find out facts, before I reach a conclusion.

Welcome to the KGB.

Just as NYTimes' Frank Rich warned in his OpEd this past Sunday:

"...this program may have more to do with monitoring "traitors" like reporters and leakers than with tracking terrorists."

And i bet we could add political opponents and candidates to that list too.

I am a journalism graduate, UNC-Chapel Hill. I am also a veteran.
I hope they catch every government leaker of classified secret information and put them in prison for life. And any reporter publishing known classified secret information should be shot. It is called treason, not first amendment rights.

The Government appears to be more concerned about 'leaks' than they are about anything else.

The term 'National Security' was used as a reason to spy on war protestors during the Nixon era and it is used excessively now.

If we are o.k. with trolling phone numbers for a large data base then don't be surprised if this method is used for other nefarious reasons, especially since this comes right behind attempts to get medical records of women who had aboriton to search for teen abortions, attempting to get library and book store records, e-mail and telephone conversations listened to and it was suggested at one time that Americans could spy on each other and report back. I think the example was a Pizza delivery person sees a person making a bomb as he orders pizza.

It's a slippery slope and we are fast giving our freedom and liberty so fought for by thousands of young men and women in wars, conflicts and police actions. What a disgrace.