U.S. appeals court rules NSA can keep collecting phone records until November

A federal judge's ruling that blocked the NSA from continuing bulk collection of cellphone metadata has been overturned. U.S. District Court Judge Richard Leon had stopped the collection until the new provisions guiding bulk collection included in the USA Freedom Act are implemented at the end of November.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit said there were not sufficient grounds for the preliminary injunction imposed by the lower court. The law in question expired in June and was revised by Congress.

The three-judge panel concluded that the case was not moot despite the change in the law and sent the case back to U.S. District Court Judge Richard Leon for further proceedings.

"Although one could reasonably infer from the evidence presented the government collected plaintiffs' own metadata, one could also conclude the opposite," wrote Judge Janice Rogers Brown. As such, the plaintiffs "fall short of meeting the higher burden of proof required for a preliminary injunction," she added.

Under the new law, the bulk metadata will still be collected, but by the telecoms which will store the information. The NSA will have to obtain an order from the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to query the data. But that's not until the end of November, unless a second case pending before the D.C. Circuit results in an injunction. In May, the 2nd U.S. Court of Appeals in New York ruled that the program is illegal. The D.C. Circuit will hear arguments over whether an injunction should be imposed in this case next week. In the meantime, consider the NSA vacuum still at work.