TELECOM Digest OnLine - Sorted: BellSouth Demands Retraction of NSA Report from USA Today

BellSouth Demands Retraction of NSA Report from USA Today

Del Jones (usatoday@telecom-digest.org)
Fri, 19 May 2006 11:45:08 -0500

By Jim Drinkard, USA TODAY

WASHINGTON - BellSouth asked USA TODAY on Thursday to "retract the
false and unsubstantiated statements" about the company that it
contends were in a May 11 story about a database of domestic calling
records maintained by the National Security Agency. In a letter to
the newspaper's publisher, Craig Moon, the company noted that the
story said BellSouth is "working under contract with the NSA" to
provide "phone call records of tens of millions of Americans" that
have been incorporated into the database.

"No such proof was offered by your newspaper because no such contracts
exist," stated the letter, portions of which were read by spokesman
Jeff Battcher. "You have offered no proof that BellSouth provided
massive calling data to the NSA as part of a warrantless program
because it simply did not happen."

Steve Anderson, a USA TODAY spokesman, said "We did receive the letter
this afternoon. We are reviewing it, and we will be responding."

BellSouth and two other companies named in the story, Verizon and
AT&T, have since been sued in federal court for $200 billion by
plaintiffs alleging violations of privacy, telecommunications law and
the Constitution. BellSouth and Verizon have denied providing
information to the NSA. AT&T has said it won't comment on national
security matters.

USA TODAY first contacted BellSouth more than five weeks ago. On the
night before the story was published, the newspaper described the
story in detail to BellSouth, and the company did not challenge the
newspaper's account. The company's official response at that time:
"BellSouth does not provide any confidential customer information to
the NSA or any governmental agency without proper legal authority."

BellSouth first raised questions on Monday. It said, "Based on our
review to date, we have confirmed no such contract exists and we have
not provided bulk customer calling records to the NSA."

Find this article at:

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2006-05-18-bellsouth-nsa_x.htm?csp=34

Copyright 2006 USA Today

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