The National Security Agency has been keeping a record of the pornography-viewing habits of Muslim Americans, according to leaker Edward Snowden. Documents to back up his claims were provided to The Huffington Post, which prompted the American Civil Liberties Union to issue a statement shortly afterward.
“This report is an unwelcome reminder of what it means to give an intelligence agency unfettered access to individuals’ most sensitive information. One ordinarily associates these kinds of tactics with the secret police services of authoritarian governments. That these tactics have been adopted by the world’s leading democracy — and the world’s most powerful intelligence agency — is truly chilling.”
The documents provided to The Huffington Post identify six Muslim targets as “exemplars” of “how ’personal vulnerabilities’ can be learned through electronic surveillance, and then exploited to undermine a target’s credibility, reputation and authority.”
The targets, while allegedly deemed to be “radical,” were not involved with terrorism, according to the documents provided to The Huffington Post.
“Wherever you are, the NSA’s databases store information about your political views, your medical history, your intimate relationships and your activities online,” Jameel Jaffer, deputy legal director of the ACLU, told The Huffington Post. “The NSA says this personal information won’t be abused, but these documents show that the NSA probably defines ’abuse’ very narrowly.”
• Douglas Ernst can be reached at dernst@washingtontimes.com.
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