Reuters: U.S.: Obama: surveillance safeguards worked, but must be improved

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Obama: surveillance safeguards worked, but must be improved Aug 23rd 2013, 13:07 Tweet Share this Email Print Related News Britain defends detention of journalist's partner Wed, Aug 21 2013 NSA surveillance covers 75 percent of U.S. Internet traffic -WSJ Tue, Aug 20 2013 Snowden journalist to publish UK secrets after Britain detains partner Mon, Aug 19 2013 Analysis & Opinion How the Guardian protects state secrets, and weak reporting at Ad Age It's time for Obama to defy Putin U.S. President Barack Obama steps off his bus at Magnolia's Deli and Cafe in Rochester, New York, August 22, 2013. Credit: Reuters/Jason Reed Fri Aug 23, 2013 9:07am EDT (Reuters) - Safeguards to ensure that U.S. surveillance measures are not abused have worked but must be improved as technology advances, President Barack Obama said in an interview with CNN that aired on Friday. The Obama administration has been on the defensive since former U.S. contractor Edward Snowden revealed information on the sweep of secret government surveillance measures. The president has made a point of saying the programs were not spying on Americans. But documents released this week showed the National Security Agency may have unintentionally collected as many as 56,000 emails of Americans per year between 2008 and 2011. A secret U.S. court subsequently said the program may have violated U.S. law. The revelations led to new questions about operations by the eavesdropping NSA and its oversight by the secret U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC). Obama said the discovery of the mistake and the court's demand that safeguards be improved showed the system of oversight had functioned appropriately. "All these safeguards, checks, audits, oversight worked," he said in the interview on CNN's "New Day" program. But the president acknowledged, as he has before, that more could be done to increase the public's confidence in the programs. "There are legitimate concerns that people have that technology is moving so quick that, you know, at some point, does the technology outpace the laws that are in place and the protections that are in place?" he said. "Do some of these systems end up being like a loaded gun out there that somebody at some future point could abuse?" he added. Obama said he was confident the NSA was not abusing its powers. "What I recognize is that we're going to have to continue to improve the safeguards and, as technology moves forward, that means that we may be able to build technologies that give people more assurance, and we do have to do a better job of giving people confidence in how these programs work," he said. (Reporting by Jeff Mason; Editing by Vicki Allen) Tweet this Link this Share this Digg this Email Reprints We welcome comments that advance the story through relevant opinion, anecdotes, links and data. If you see a comment that you believe is irrelevant or inappropriate, you can flag it to our editors by using the report abuse links. Views expressed in the comments do not represent those of Reuters. For more information on our comment policy, see http://blogs.reuters.com/fulldisclosure/2010/09/27/toward-a-more-thoughtful-conversation-on-stories/ Comments (0) Be the first to comment on reuters.com. Add yours using the box above.

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