© Reuters. FILE PHOTO: The seal of the Federal Bureau of Investigation is seen at FBI headquarters before a press conference by FBI Director Christopher Wray on the US Department of Justice inspector general’s report on the actions of the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
By Zeba Siddiqui
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – A US court found the FBI improperly searched a US foreign intelligence database 278,000 times over several years, including on American criminal suspects, according to a ruling published on Friday.
The decision of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court was released by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI).
The searches occurred in the course of criminal investigations in the United States, including the riots and protests at the Capitol on January 6 after the murder of George Floyd in 2020, the court said.
The intelligence database stores digital and other information about people. The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act allows the FBI to search without a warrant the communications of foreigners abroad, including their conversations with Americans.
The court’s ruling found that the FBI violated rules on the use of the database, created under Section 702 of the FISA Law, with its searches.
Specifically, the court found that raids as part of investigations into crimes between 2016 and 2020 violated the rules because “there was no reasonable basis to expect them to return foreign intelligence or evidence of the crime,” even though the FBI believed this was “reasonably probable.” , “said the decision.
The revelations came as US President Joe Biden’s administration is trying to win congressional support for maintaining surveillance powers under Section 702, which is set to expire at the end of this year.
The ODNI said the FBI tightened its procedures in mid-2021 and 2022. “As a result, these compliance incidents do not reflect the FBI’s consultation practices subsequent to the full deployment of corrective measures,” the office said.
An FBI spokeswoman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.