The NSA watches you poop.

Obama administration is urging the Supreme Court to reject a challenge to the National Security Agency?s once-secret telephone metadata spying program.

The filing ? the first government briefing on the topic to reach the Supreme Court ? was in response to the Electronic Privacy Information Center?s petition asking the justices to halt the program that was disclosed by NSA leaker Edward Snowden.

Among other defenses, the administration said Friday that only the phone companies can challenge the secret orders from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to hand over metadata of every call made to and from the United States.

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US government attorneys argue that the Supreme Court does not have the jurisdiction to take the case, filed in July by the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC).

EPIC believes the NSA overstepped its authority by carrying out broad communications monitoring and surveillance worldwide, and demanded the program be stopped.

A US Supreme Court decision to take the case would be "a drastic and extraordinary remedy that is reserved for really extraordinary causes," argued Donald Verrilli, an administration lawyer, in a statement released late Tuesday.

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Arbitrary_sl said:

I would like to know exactly what areas the SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA doesn't have jurisdiction in.

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The Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA) has twice died in Congress, following objections from privacy advocates. Like a resilient zombie, it has risen once again and a new version of the bill ? which passed the House in the summer ? is getting support from some Senators, bolstered by NSA officials.

The bill, ostensibly aimed at protecting U.S. commerce from cyberattacks, enables companies and goverment agencies giving to share more cyber information, including the content and personal information attached to emails.

As Mother Jones reported Monday, ?NSA director Keith Alexander is publicly asking for the legislation to be re-introduced, and two senators confirmed that they are drafting a new Senate version.?

Senate Intelligence Committee chair and NSA mass surveillance apologist Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., is pairing with Sen. Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga., to put forward a senate version of CISPA, much to the continued concern of privacy advocates.

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"I think the best way to look at it is as a pre-crime assessment every time you fly," said Edward Hasbrouck, a consultant to the Identity Project, one of the groups that oppose the prescreening initiatives. "The default will be the highest, most intrusive level of search, and anything less will be conditioned on providing some additional information in some fashion."

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Much of this personal data is widely shared within the Department of Homeland Security and with other government agencies. Privacy notices for these databases note that the information may be shared with federal, state and local authorities; foreign governments; law enforcement and intelligence agencies - and in some cases, private companies for purposes unrelated to security or travel.

For instance, an update about the T.S.A.'s Transportation Security Enforcement Record System, which contains information about travelers accused of "violations or potential violations" of security regulations, warns that the records may be shared with "a debt collection agency for the purpose of debt collection."

A recent privacy notice about PreCheck notes that fingerprints submitted by people who apply for the program will be used by the F.B.I. to check its unsolved crimes database.

"The average person doesn't understand how much intelligence-driven matching is going on and how this could be accessed for other purposes," said Khaliah Barnes, a lawyer with the Electronic Privacy Information Center, which has fought to block these initiatives. "There's no meaningful oversight, transparency or accountability."

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The first tool, a browser extension called uProxy establishes an encrypted link between two users who know and trust each other?one who is trying to evade detection and one who is allowing that first user to assume his or her online identity. A Syrian activist, for example, can now experience the internet through the browser of a friend in the United States. It?s like a social networking tool for dissidents.

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"The National Security Agency ended a program used to spy on German Chancellor Angela Merkel and a number of other world leaders after an internal Obama administration review started this summer revealed to the White House the existence of the operations," the Wall Street Journal reports.

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