The federal government this week announced a reform to an investigative tool that gives the FBI sweeping surveillance power. But a target of that surveillance said the change appears to leave investigators with vast power to snoop — in secret.
The FBI uses national security letters to force business owners to hand over records on their customers, as long as the records are related to a national security investigation. No court approval is needed, and the FBI can impose a gag order on recipients, forbidding them from revealing even the existence of a letter.
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Merrill was unimpressed.
“The issue at hand is that the government doesn’t want me to discuss what was in the third page of the (national security letter) I received, namely, the types of data they demanded (and I did not hand over),” Merrill wrote. “The problem with not being able to discuss that openly, is that is the heart of the public policy issue — what kinds of information can the government get on an innocent citizen without a warrant, or even any suspicion of wrongdoing.”
