U.S. District Judge William Pauley ruled the that National Security Agency's collecting of millions of American telephone records is legal and a needed act in order preserve the nation's overall security on Friday, the Associated Press reported.
In a written statement, Pauley stated the program "represents the government's counter-punch" to the Sept.11 attacks, which he states may have been prevented if this type of data collection had taken place at the time, the AP reported.
In his written statement, Pauly wrote: "The government learned from its mistake and adapted to confront a new enemy: a terror network capable of orchestrating attacks across the world. It launched a number of counter-measures, including a bulk telephony metadata collection program - a wide net that could find and isolate gossamer contacts among suspected terrorists in an ocean of seemingly disconnected data," according to the AP.
Another lawsuit brought forth by the American Civil Liberties Union after Edward Snowden first leaked the NSA data collection which the group say violates privacy law, but Judge Pauley dismissed it, the AP reported. The ACLU was not available for comment.
The argument presented to Pauley by the ACLU lawyer stated the government's way of using and interpreting their extent of authority under the Patriot Act surpassed what is necessary for national security, and added that under their broad interpretation, they could justify the collection of financial, health and even library records from Americans without their knowledge, according to the AP.
After Pauley gave his decision on the ruling, Justice Department spokesman Peter Carr said "We are pleased with the decision," the AP reported.
Earlier this month a similar lawsuit was presented to U.S. District Court Judge Richard Leon who deemed the NSA spying unconstitutional and said they lawyers would have no problem proving that invasion of privacy rights, the AP reported. Leon said the NSA program "violates the U.S. Constitution's ban on unreasonable search."
