"Legal" is not the same as "constitutional."

Yesterday, we learned that our government has been spying on cell phone records. And, last night we found out that the National Security Agency and the FBI are mining data on the servers of at least nine major technology companies. Under a top-secret program, known as PRISM, our government has been collecting audio, video, e-mail, and more from companies like Yahoo, Google, Facebook, Skype, and Apple.

Data analysts at Fort Meade claim that they designed search criteria that produce “at least 51 percent confidence in a target's 'foreignness.'” According to The Think Progress Blog, analysts have access to Facebook's “surveillance capabilities,” and they can monitor any combination of “audio, video, chat, and file transfer” conducted via Skype. Allegedly, Google also allows the monitoring of “Gmail, voice and video chat, photo libraries, and live surveillance of search terms.” The intelligence officer who leaked the information to The Washington Post said, “they quite literally can watch your ideas form as you type.”

Both Apple and Facebook have denied participation in the program, and Google has insisted they do not have a so-called “back door” that would give the government access to such information. James Clapper, the director of national intelligence, has called the disclosure of the internet surveillance program “reprehensible.” He also said that the document leak revealing the cell-phone monitoring program is a threat to our national security. Mr. Clapper claimed that neither of these programs may be “used to intentionally target any U.S. Citizen,” and insisted the programs are “entirely legal.”

Just because a secret FISA court declared these programs legal, does not mean they're constitutional. Americans are angry, and they are demanding our government put an end to the invasive process of spying on citizens.

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