The controversy over the sharing of calling records by phone companies with the National Security Agency (NSA) has reached a new high (or low, depending on your perspective) with the announcement that the state of New Jersey has issued subpoenas to AT&T, Verizon, Qwest, Sprint Nextel, and Cingular Wireless to see if they violated the state's consumer protectiong laws by sharing information with the NSA.
The NSA has instituted a strategy to track possible terrorist activities by compiling phone records of people they deem "suspicious," but critics say this program is ripe for abuse and that innocent people could have their cellular and landline phone activity, as well as their general rights to privacy, scrutinized without clear probable cause.
Obviously, this issue has been debated back and forth, and it'll be interesting to see if the federal and various state governments can come to a consensus as to how this program can proceed with it being abused.
