Re:Meet the 16 People Responsible for Protecting Your Privacy
by tptacek on Friday June 21, 2013 @01:59PM
(#5919802)
To repeat a comment downthread: I think the most deceptive thing about FISC is that it's not really a court. It happens to be staffed with federal court judges, and it can issue binding court orders on a limited set of subject areas, but that's it; in every other way, FISC functions as a form of internal review board.
FISC exists because there is no Constitutional anchor to policies regarding foreign intelligence. Foreign powers do not have rights under the Fourth Amendment. No state really requires its spies to get warrants for all their foreign targets.
But in the wake of the Nixon administration, Congress decided it needed some way to create and enforce policy for NSA. It can pass laws, but without an ongoing process by which NSA's actions are forced to engage those laws, they'd be toothless. So we get FISC, a sort of para-court.
FISC exists because there is no Constitutional anchor to policies regarding foreign intelligence. Foreign powers do not have rights under the Fourth Amendment. No state really requires its spies to get warrants for all their foreign targets.
But in the wake of the Nixon administration, Congress decided it needed some way to create and enforce policy for NSA. It can pass laws, but without an ongoing process by which NSA's actions are forced to engage those laws, they'd be toothless. So we get FISC, a sort of para-court.