Opinion ID: 4465383
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: Storage and Querying

Text: Once communications are collected and retained or disseminated, each agency may establish databases to store those communications in its possession, and may query those stored communications to identify information of interest in connection with a particular investigation or agency function. The NSA, CIA, and FBI each maintain separate databases containing Section 702 information on which the agencies rely for their own purposes. PCLOB Report at 55-56. According to the PCLOB,. the NSA, for instance, 11 often 34 stores data acquired from multiple legal authorities in a single data repository.'' PCLOB at 55. The agency then tags the sources for each piece of information, and has systems that prevent an analyst from accessing or querying data acquired under a legal authority for which the analyst does not have the requisite training. 12 Id. at 55-56. The CIA limits access to databases that contain Section 702-acquired information to only those agents who have had the requisite training. Id. at 55. And the FBI stores electronic data obtained from traditional FISA electronic surveillance and physical searches ... in the same repositories as the FBI stores Section 702-acquired data. Id. at 59. An agent without requisite training would see whether a piece of Section 702-acquired information was responsive to her query, but she would not be able to view the actual underlying material without clearance. Id. 1 'Data is frequently reviewed through queries, which identify communications that have particular characteristics specified in the query, such as containing a particular name or having been sent to or from a partic ular e-mail address. Id. at 127. Colloquially, the parties (and those engaged in policy 12Each agency with access to Section 702 data provides training to personnel regarding the proper use of Section 702 material, as well as the agency's minimization procedures. See PCLOB Report at 53-54. The exact training procedures and who is trained may vary by agency. 35 debates about the program) have referred to this querying capability as backdoor searches. Originally, the minimization procedures precluded analysts from searching terms associated with United States persons. See Classified Supplemental App'x at 121-22 In April 2011, the government sought approval for new minimization procedures that allowed the querying of terms related to United States persons. See Bates Decision, 2011 WL 10945618 at '7-8. The FISC ultimately approved the new procedures in October 2011 (i.e., after Hasbajrami's arrest) because they were designed to yield foreign intelligence information.'' Id. at •7_ Querying, the court stated, should not be problematic in a collection that is focused on non-United States persons located outside the United States and that, in the aggregate, is less 36 likely to result in the acquisition of nonpublic information regarding non­ consenting United States persons. Id. In a June 2014 letter to Senator Wyden, Deirdre Walsh, Director of Legislative Affairs for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, stated that each of the three agencies allowed querying. The NSA could query Section 702-acquired information if it had a reasonable basis to expect the query will return foreign intelligence,'' as could the CIA and the FBI. See Response to Question from the 5 June 2014 Hearing, Letter from Deirdre Walsh, Director of Legislative Affairs, to Senator Ron Wyden (June 27, 2014) (Walsh Letter); see also PCLOB Report at 57-58. The FBI is also allowed to query its own databases in such a way that these queries are designed to find and extract evidence of a crime. Walsh Letter at 2. The FBI also will query previously acquired information from a variety of sources, including Section 702 when it opens new national security investigations. Id. at 3. Recently, and after the time pericxl at issue in this case, Congress enacted the FISA Amendments Reauthorization Act of 2017, Pub. L. No. 115-118, 132 Stat. 3 (2018), codified at SO U.S.C. § 1881a. The act amended the FAA to require the agencies to develop querying procedures alongside their targeting and 37 minimization procedures and seek approval of all three sets of procedures yearly from the FISC. Congress also amended the FAA to require a court order in most cases where the FBI seeks to access the contents of communications ... that were retrieved pursuant to a query made using a United States person query term that was not designed to find and extract foreign intelligence information.'' 50 U.S.C. § 1881a{f)(2)(A). Such querying standards were not in place when the surveillance at issue here occurred. Ill. The District Court's Denial of Hasbajrami's Suppression Motion As noted above, Hasbajrami moved to suppress the fruits of all warrantless FAA surveillance. See Suppression Motion at 8. He also moved for discovery of the FISA and Section 702 information relevant to his case. After the district court reviewed the relevant materials ex parte and in camera, it denied the suppression motion. See United States v, Hasbajrami, 1:11-cr623, 2016 WL 1029500 (E.D.N.Y. Feb. 18, 2016) (Suppression Decision''). 13 It treated the suppression motion as an as-applied challenge to the Section 702 surveillance used to support the government's initial application to the FISC, 13As addressed below, the district court announced its decision on February 15, 2015, in a text order on the docket, issued without an opinion. The redacted opinion was issued on the public docket in March 2016. 38 primarily addressing the issue of collection. Id. at . First, after noting the , distinction between PRISM and upstream collection, the court concluded that [n]one of the Section 702 communications used in Title I and Title II FISA applications targeting the agent of the foreign power were 'about' communications and therefore the constitutionality of upstream collection [was] not at issue in Hasbajrami's case. Id. at -7. The district court then turned to PRISM collection. Summarizing precedent, the court noted that the Fourth Amendment does not constrain the government from collecting the communications of non-U.S. individuals targeted by Section 702 surveillance. Id. at .,.7, Although Hasbajrami was a legal perm.anent resident located in the United States, the court found that it was non-U.S. persons who were the targets of Section 702 surveillance and that Hasbajrami's e-mails were collected incidentally to the surveillance of individuals the court described as legitimate targets of Section 702 surveillance. Id. The court concluded that the incidental interception of the communications of individuals in the United States was constitutional because the surveillance was lawful in the first place - whether it is the domestic surveillance of U.S. persons pursuant to a warrant or the warrantless surveillance 39 of non-U.S. persons who are abroad - [and therefore] the incidental interception of non-targeted U.S. persons' communications with the targeted persons is also lawful. Id. at 11-9, The court did not address whether any inadvertent collection related to Hasbajrami. It also did not address the specifics of any querying as applied to Hasbajrami in particular, and there does not appear to have been any fact­ finding regarding the querying of previously-collected communications with identifiers related to Hasbajrami. Instead, the parties had raised querying within the context of whether the minimization procedures were reasonable, and the government argued that it was permitted to query whatever data it had lawfully collected even if it used identifiers it knew were associated with United States persons. See Gov't Mem. of Law at 71, United States v. Hasbajrami, 1:ll-c:r-623 (E.D.N.Y. filed Dec. 23, 2014), ECF No. 97. To the extent that the district court considered querying, then, it appeared to adopt the government's position, stating in a footnote: That the government is able to query information obtained under the PRISM program, i.e. lawfully­ obtained communications that were to or from legitimate targets, does not render the minimization procedures inadequate, as amici contend .... Here, once the government learned that the target was potentially 40 an agent of a foreign power, the government sought orders from the FISC for electronic surveillance and physical searches pursuant to Title I and Title III of FISA targeting an agent of a foreign power .... I agree with the government that [i]t would be perverse to authorize the unrestricted review of lawfully collected information but then [] restrict the targeted review of the same information in response to tailored inquiries. Gov't Br. at 71-72. Suppression Decision, 2016 WL 1029500 at  n.20. As for Hasbajrami's request to provide discovery to properly-cleared defense counsel, the district court concluded that disclosure was unnecessary. Id. at '14. Instead, its review was relatively straightforward and not complex and the district court was able to evaluate the legality of the challenged surveillance without concluding that due process first warranted disclosure. Id. at  (citing United States v. Abu-Jihaad, 630 F.3d 102, 129 (2d Cir. 2010)).