Top > World > 2006 > June > 2006-06-18

Federal Government Sues to Stop Inquiries

The federal government is using national security as an excuse to sue New Jersey state officials who are conducting investigations into allegations that certain telephone service providers passed on information about calls made by customers to the National Security Agency (NSA) illegally. The Justice Department says that the inquiries being made threaten to reveal certain aspects of national security that the government insists must be kept quiet as the War on Terror is being conducted, but privacy rights activists and ordinary Americans question the validity of using the War on Terror as a blanket excuse to expand the government?s .

There are more than 20 lawsuits nationwide stemming from the initial reports that AT&T, Verizon, and other major phone companies provided customer records to the NSA without the prior receipt of a court order. Those investigating the claims say that if there was information sharing, this would translate to a breach in consumer protection laws.

One of the subjects of the federal lawsuits includes New Jersey Attorney General Zulima Farber, who forwarded subpoenas to phone companies wondering if they participated in information sharing with the NSA. The government filed its case in the U.S. District Court in Trenton, New Jersey, and where it goes from there could determine if the many other cases around the country go forward, are dropped, or if the case goes all the way to the Supreme Court, in which case a precedent setting decision would likely come forth.