Opinion ID: 4465383
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: PRISM and Upstream Collection

Text: The NSA operates two separate types of collection programs which collect different types of information. These two programs have come to be labelled PRISM collection and upstream collection. Under PRISM, the FBI (on behalf of the NSA) sends selectors (for instance, an e-mail address) to internet service providers (ISPs), based in the United States. The ISPs are then required to provide communications sent to or from that selector to the NSA. See PCLOB Report at 33-34. PRISM, therefore, collects only the e-mails a given user sends from his or her account, and the e­ mails he or she receives from others through that account. Id. at 34. Collection 24 and review of such material happens roughly in real time, or close to real time. In other words, �he collected e-mails are not simply swept into a database for use at some unspecified future time when the database is queried, but are monitored and analyzed at or near the time of their collection. In that regard, the interception and review of electronic communications under PRISM resembles a traditional domestic law enforcement wiretap. Upstream collection is broader. Instead of compelling information from an ISP, the NSA instead compels information from the providers that control the telecommunications backbone over which communications transit. PCLOB Report at 35. Upstream fills a gap in PRISM surveillance. Id. If, for instance, an individual that the NSA sought to target maintained his or her e-mail account with a foreign internet service provider, that e-mail address would be out of reach of the PRISM program. In that situation, the NSA could use upstream collection to collect traffic to that account as it traversed the backbone. Id. Upstream collection is broader than PRISM, in that it captures not only conversations to and from a given e-mail address, but also communications about that address (i.e., a conversation between two parties not themselves targeted that happens to mention whatever the tasked term is). See id. at 37-38. 25 One key difference between PRISM and upstream collection is that PRISM collects individual communications, while upstream collects whole 1'multi­ communication transactions, or MCTs. Id. at 39. An Internet transaction refers to any set of data that travels across the Internet together such that it may be understood by a device on the Internet. Id. Thus, a transaction might contain a single discrete com munication (e.g., a single e-mail), or it could contain multiple discrete communications, and [i]f a single discrete communication within an MCT is to, from, or about a Section 702-tasked selector, and at least one end of the transaction is foreign, the NSA will acquire the entire MCT under upstream collection. Id. The result is a greater likelihood that upstream collection will result in the acquisition of wholly domestic communications and extraneous U.S. person information. Id. at 41. The NSA is the only agency that receives upstream collection; the CIA and FBI are not provided with information obtained in this manner and do not store it in their databases. Id. at 54.