Justice Department collected metadata on Americans’ international calls

A Drug Enforcement Administration official said in a filing on Thursday that the agency, an arm of the Justice Department, used administrative subpoenas, not federal court orders, for a long time to gather the data of Americans’ calls to other countries.
 
The metadata included information such as the numbers Americans dialed and the duration of their calls, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.
 
Meanwhile, Patrick Toomey, a lawyer with the American Civil Liberties Union, said the new revelations are indicative of the fact that “the government has extended its use of bulk collection far beyond” terror and national-security cases.
 
In March 2014, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D., Vt.), the then-head of the Senate Judiciary Committee wrote a private letter to Attorney General Eric Holder in which he expressed concerns about US spying programs on Americans.
 
In the letter, made public Friday, Leahy wrote that  he is “deeply concerned about this kind of suspicionless intrusion into American’s privacy in any context,” adding what is more troubling is the fact that it is done “for routine criminal investigations.’’
 
No court had ever reviewed the program and no judge had ever controlled the way and how the database was searched, he mentioned in his letter.
 
According to AFP, a US Justice Department official said the program was suspended in September 2013 before it was completely shut down.
 
"The program was suspended in September 2013 and ultimately terminated," Justice Department official Marc Raimondi said.
 
In June 2013, Edward Snowden, a former National Security Agency contractor, leaked classified intelligence documents, revealing the extent of the NSA's spying activities.
 
His disclosure sparked massive protests from civil liberties groups and fueled a national debate about the extent of government surveillance.