NSA’s phone collection program has no discernible impact on preventing acts of terrorism

Barack Obama hardest hit...

Via Hot Air

Consider this confirmation of an earlier analysis reported by the Washington Post and NBC in the pre-Christmas doldrums. Despite repeated claims by the White House that the NSA’s phone collection program may have prevented as many as 50 terrorist attacks against the US, another independent study found that the surveillance “has had no discernible impact on preventing acts of terrorism” (via the Daily Beast):
An analysis of 225 terrorism cases inside the United States since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks has concluded that the bulk collection of phone records by the National Security Agency “has had no discernible impact on preventing acts of terrorism.”
In the majority of cases, traditional law enforcement and investigative methods provided the tip or evidence to initiate the case, according to the study by the New America Foundation, a Washington-based nonprofit group.
The study, to be released Monday, corroborates the findings of a White House-appointed review group, which said last month that the NSA counterterrorism program “was not essential to preventing attacks” and that much of the evidence it did turn up “could readily have been obtained in a timely manner using conventional [court] orders.” Keep on reading