Intelligence chief critical of NSA document leaks

WASHINGTON -- The director of national intelligence is trying to set the record straight after leaked documents revealed information about two top-secret intelligence-gathering programs.

James Clapper says the disclosure of an Internet surveillance program is "reprehensible" and a document leak about a phone records program could cause long-lasting and irreversible harm to the nation's ability to respond to threats.

Clapper says articles about the programs contained inaccuracies and omitted key information. He's declassifying some details about the authority used in the phone records program because he says Americans must know the program's limits.

Those details include that a special court reviews the program every 90 days. He says the court prohibits the government from indiscriminately sifting through phone data and queries are only allowed when facts support reasonable suspicion.

At issue is a court order, first disclosed Wednesday by The Guardian newspaper in Britain, that requires the communications company Verizon to turn over on an "ongoing, daily basis" records of all landline and mobile telephone calls of its customers, both within the United States and between the United States and other countries.

Intelligence experts said the government, though not listening in on calls, would be looking for patterns that could lead to terrorists -- and that there was every reason to believe similar orders were in place for other phone companies.

Some critics in Congress, as well as civil liberties advocates, declared that the sweeping nature of the National Security Agency program disclosed yesterday represented an unwarranted intrusion into Americans' private lives. But a number of lawmakers, including some Republicans, lauded the program's effectiveness.

Leaders of the House Intelligence Committee said the program had helped thwart at least one attempted terrorist attack in the United States, "possibly saving American lives."

One outraged senator, Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) said: "When law-abiding Americans make phone calls, who they call, when they call and where they call is private information. As a result of the discussion that came to light today, now we're going to have a real debate."

But Republican Lindsay Graham of South Carolina said Americans have no cause for concern.

"If you're not getting a call from a terrorist organization, you've got nothing to worry about," he said.