A major story making headlines recently has been the revelation that the NSA, the federal agency in charge of clandestine surveillance, has been collecting millions of phone call records from major telecommunications carriers. These records are being assembled as part of what reports describe as a secret program to create the world's largest database of personal information. While this effort is being defended as an important way to root out possible terrorist activity, critics worry about the danger it poses to the right of privacy and suggest that the program violates numerous laws.
