US senators say there’s “no evidence” bulk metadata surveillance is useful | Ars Technica

US senators say there’s “no evidence” bulk metadata surveillance is useful | Ars Technica.

The senators write:

Just as in the cases of Mr. Medunjanin and Mr. Moalin, however, it appears that Mr. al-Mihdhar’s phone number could also have been obtained by the government using a variety of alternate means. Before September 11, the government was surveilling a safe house in Yemen but failed to realize that Mr. al-Mihdhar, who was in contact with the safe house, was actually inside the United States. The government could have used any number of authorities to determine whether anyone in the United States was in contact with the safe house that it was already targeting. It did not need a record of every American’s phone calls to establish that simple connection.

. . .

Of note, intelligence officials have repeatedly asserted that additional examples, which remain secret, show that the bulk phone-records collection program has “contributed to” or “provided value in” the investigation of a total of twelve different “homeland-related terrorist events.” Amici have reviewed all twelve of these examples and have yet to see any evidence that the bulk phone-records program provided any information that was materially useful to any terrorism cases other than those involving Mr. Moalin and Mr. Medjunanin. In the opinion of Amici, the claim that the bulk phone-records collection program has “contributed to” twelve different counterterrorism investigations would not withstand public scrutiny, unless it were accompanied by new evidence that has not been provided to Amici.