Master consolidated complaint against BellSouth | Electronic Frontier Foundation
2007/12/17/1227RTFA: http://www.eff.org/cases/att/attachments/master-co…
68. Since on or about February 1, 2001, BellSouth has disclosed and/or divulged the “call-detail records” of all or substantially all of their customers, including Plaintiffs, to the NSA, in violation of federal law, as more particularly set forth below.
69. BellSouth has, since on or about February 1, 2001, been disclosing to the NSA “individually identifiable customer proprietary network information” belonging to all or substantially all of their customers, including Plaintiffs, in violation of federal law, as more particularly set forth below.
Today, on the US Senate floor, a bill is being discussed that may or may not include a provision that grants retroactive amnesty to telecommunications companies that participated in the NSA’s domestic surveillance of telephones in the US. Bush has said that he will veto any bill that doesn’t include amnesty.
The excerpt above was taken from the complaint filed specifically against BellSouth, from the Factual Allegations section. These simple facts will mean everything, because if they are accepted as fact, it indicates that there is evidence this domestic surveillance program began seven months before September 11, 2001.
George W. Bush was sworn into office on January 20, 2001. This lawsuit would establish that, within two weeks of swearing to uphold the US Constitution, Bush had authorized the establishment of this surveillance program.
Today, the US Senate will decide whether or not this lawsuit, and others like it, should be thrown out of court.