A U.S. federal appeals court on Monday upheld nondisclosure rules that allow the FBI to secretly issue surveillance orders for customer data to communications firms, a ruling that dealt a blow to privacy advocates.
A unanimous three-judge panel on the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco sided with a lower court decision in finding that rules permitting the Federal Bureau of Investigation to send national security letters under gag orders are appropriate and do not violate the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution's free speech protections.
Content distribution firm Cloudflare and phone network operator CREDO Mobile had sued the government in order to notify customers of five national security letters, or NSLs, received between 2011 and 2013.
The FBI's use of NSLs has drawn increased scrutiny as new transparency laws have let companies publish some of the letters, which has shown the agency may have run afoul of rules restricting their use.
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-surveillance-idUSKBN1A21XJ