Lawsuit Targets AT&T; Over Domestic Spying Program
An Internet rights group filed suit Tuesday against AT&T;, accusing the long-distance telephone giant of violating federal privacy laws by helping the National Security Agency monitor calls and e-mail as part of its recently disclosed domestic spying operation.
“As best we can tell, the NSA program is apparently the biggest fishing expedition ever devised, scanning millions of ordinary Americans’ calls and e-mails for suspicious patterns,” said Kevin Bankston, a lawyer for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which filed the suit.
“Based on the published reports and after a reasonable investigation, we think that discovery is going to show that AT&T; has opened up its network to direct access by the NSA,” Bankston said.
AT&T; Corp. was bought last year by SBC Communications, which assumed the name AT&T; Inc. It declined to comment.
The San Francisco-based Electronic Frontier Foundation, a nonprofit established in 1990, has waged a number of legal battles involving Internet privacy, free speech and copyright enforcement. It joins the American Civil Liberties Union and the Center for Constitutional Rights in bringing suits related to the federal eavesdropping program. However, Tuesday’s action is the first aimed at a private company presumably acting on behalf of the government.
The suit asserts that in cooperating with the National Security Agency, the largest U.S. phone company violated wiretapping and electronic privacy laws, since intercepting communications is prohibited except where authorized by law.
The case, filed in San Francisco’s U.S. District Court on behalf of three AT&T; customers, seeks class-action status.
The suit cites newspaper articles, including one by the New York Times, for disclosing the eavesdropping program aimed at terrorist communications with sympathizers and others inside the United States. Also cited was a Los Angeles Times report that the National Security Agency had access to an AT&T; database tracking calling records.
Lawsuits against companies that do the government’s bidding are rare but not unprecedented. A judge in Virginia ruled in 2004 that America Online could be found liable for giving information on a subscriber to local police officers who lacked a signed search warrant.
