What spy agency might do with your telephone calls

BOSTON — If the National Security Agency (NSA) is indeed amassing a colossal database of Americans' phone records, one way to use all that information is in "social-network analysis," a data-mining method that aims to expose previously invisible connections among people.

Social-network analysis has gained prominence in business and intelligence circles under the belief that it can yield extraordinary insights, such as the fact that people in disparate organizations have common acquaintances. Companies can buy social-networking software to help determine who has the best connections for a particular sales pitch.

So it did not surprise many security analysts to learn Thursday from USA Today that the NSA is applying the technology to billions of phone records.

The information enables U.S. intelligence agencies to track who calls whom, and when, but does not include the contents of conversations.

"Who you're talking to often matters much more than what you're saying," said Bruce Schneier, a computer-security expert and author of "Beyond Fear: Thinking Sensibly About Security in an Uncertain World."

The NSA declined to comment. But several experts said it seemed likely the agency would want to assemble a picture from more than just landline phone records.

Other forms of communication, including cellphone calls, e-mail and instant messages, likely are trackable targets as well, at least on international networks if not inside the United States.

Monitoring newer communications services is probably harder than getting billing records from landline phones. USA Today reported that the NSA has collected call logs from the three largest U.S. phone companies: BellSouth, AT&T and Verizon Communications. A fourth phone company, Qwest, refused to disclose the information.

The three phone companies began turning over the records of tens of millions of customers' phone calls to the NSA program shortly after Sept. 11, 2001, said USA Today, citing anonymous sources it said had direct knowledge of the arrangement.

That level of cooperation confirmed the fears of many privacy analysts, who pointed out that AT&T is already being sued in federal court in San Francisco for allegedly giving the NSA access to contents of its phone and Internet networks.

The suit, filed by the Electronic Frontier Foundation and based on documents from a former AT&T technician, says secret spying rooms and electronic-surveillance equipment were installed by the NSA in AT&T facilities in Seattle and several cities in California to monitor communications. The government is seeking to dismiss the case, citing "the military and state-secrets privilege," according to the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

Facing congressional criticism that greeted news of the NSA phone program, President Bush sought to assure Americans on Thursday that their civil liberties were "fiercely protected."

He offered assurances that the NSA program did not randomly invade the privacy of Americans who subscribe to AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth phone services.

"We're not mining or trolling through the personal lives of millions of innocent Americans," Bush said. "Our efforts are focused on links to al-Qaida and their known affiliates. So far we've been very successful in preventing another attack on our soil."

The top-ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee said he was shocked by the reported activities.

"It's not one party's government. It's America's government. Those entrusted with great power have a duty to answer to Americans what they are doing," said Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont.

Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Arlen Specter, R-Pa., said he would call the phone companies to appear before the panel to find out what had happened.

"We're really flying blind on the subject, and that's not a good way to approach the Fourth Amendment and the constitutional issues involving privacy," Specter said of domestic surveillance in general.

The companies said Thursday they were protecting customers' privacy but also had an obligation to help law-enforcement and government agencies ensure the nation's security.

Last December, the administration acknowledged it had secretly authorized another NSA program that included intercepting international phone calls that involved parties in the United States.

Federal laws prohibit the NSA, which conducts electronic surveillance worldwide, from spying on U.S. citizens unless a court approves it.

It remains unclear whether other communications providers have been asked for their call logs or billing records.

Verizon Wireless spokesman Jeffrey Nelson said his company was "not involved in this situation." His counterparts at Cingular — an AT&T/BellSouth joint venture — and Sprint Nextel were less explicit and did not deny participation.

In an e-mail statement Thursday, T-Mobile USA said it does not participate "in any NSA program for warrantless surveillance and acquisition of call records, and T-Mobile has not provided any such access to communications or customer records."

Even without cellphone carriers' help, calls between wireless subscribers and Verizon, AT&T and BellSouth landlines presumably would be captured.

The NSA, even without full inside help, has proved adept at capturing communications or at least analyzing traffic information. The Echelon program, for example, is known to have tapped into satellite, microwave and fiber-optic phone links — including undersea cables — to gain insight into what the rest of the world was talking about.

The Internet does present new challenges for snoops, which has led federal authorities to seek an expansion of a key surveillance law so that it applies to new kinds of Web services.

But even now authorities can tap into data feeds. There is a relatively small number of major Internet backbones and junctions where networks hand information off to each other.

"It's not trivial to analyze all the material, but it's trivial to get to the material," said Barry Steinhardt, director of the technology and liberty program at the American Civil Liberties Union.

There is a limit to the government's capabilities.

Social-network analysis would appear to be powerless against criminals and terrorists who rely on a multitude of cellphones, pay phones, calling cards and Internet cafes.

And then there are more creative ways of getting off the grid. In the Madrid train-bombings case, the plotters communicated by sharing one e-mail account and saving messages to each other as drafts that didn't traverse the Internet like regular mail messages would.

Material from The Seattle Times staff is included in this report.