The Government Is Spying on America with Drones, Too

[DevonRex]

53. Finally. From my favorite law site, Cornell. A Wex article.

http://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/electronic_surveillance

"In 1978, Congress passed the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). The Act lowers the evidentiary showing needed to obtain a surveillance warrant with regard to foreign intelligence gathering and describes other procedures relating to physical and electronic surveillance relating to foreign intelligence. The Act's provisions also applies to American citizens suspected of espionage.

FISA's provisions permit electronic surveillance in two situations. First, FISA authorizes the President to use warrantless wiretapping if it relates to protecting the United States against a potential grave attack, sabotage, or espionage, on the that the government does not tap any U.S. citizen. Second, federal law enforcement may obtain a warrant for foreign intelligence taps that do not meet the criteria of the first situation. To obtain the warrant, the FISA court must find probable cause that the person to be tapped constitutes a foreign power or the agent of a foreign power and that a foreign power uses or will use the place to be tapped. FISA also created its own court system, housed within the Department of Justice. Known as "FISA courts" they deal exclusively with foreign intelligence warrant applications, orders directing compliance, and challenges to compliance orders."
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The article is very informative, in case there are other things you need to know. It is on Cornell Law, the Cornell Law School's official site that is used by their own law students as well as law students all across the nation and even the globe.