FBI improperly used intelligence database to snoop on US senator

An FBI analyst improperly used an intelligence community surveillance tool to search the name of a US senator, a state senator and state judge last year, according to court records released on Friday. 

The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court’s opinion, released as part of a public records request, reveals that the queries were made under Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act – which permits the government to conduct targeted surveillance of foreign persons located outside the US – and occurred in June and October of last year.

The court said the queries made by the analyst didn’t meet the legal standard set by the government and demonstrated a “failure” to follow FBI policy. 

“Some violations of the querying standard coincided with failure to follow an FBI policy that requires prior Deputy Director approval to use ‘sensitive query terms’ — e.g. identifiers of domestic public officials, domestic political candidates, members of the news media, academics, and religious organizations or persons prominent within them,” the opinion states.

“The following queries did not meet the ‘reasonably likely to retrieve’ standard and also contravened this FBI policy,” it read.

The identities of the senator and state officials queried were not revealed in the ruling, which was issued by Judge Rudolph Contreras in April. 

In March, Rep. Darin LaHood (R-Colo.) accused the FBI of using the same controversial program to “wrongfully” search his name multiple times in the same database between December of 2019 and May of 2020.

LaHood confronted FBI Director Christopher Wray about the incident during a House Intelligence Committee hearing, telling him that the case “is indicative of the culture that the FBI has come to expect and even tolerate” and an “egregious” violation that “degrades the trust in FISA.” 

The Section 702 program authorizes the bulk collection of electronic communications data — such as phone calls and text messages — for intelligence officials to use as a database to search for foreign targets.

Civil liberties advocates have long protested that Section 702 infringes on Americans’ privacy by allowing US citizens’ information to get swept up in the process of collecting intelligence on foreign targets. 

The program is set to expire at the end of the year unless Congress renews it.