FBI tightens the reins

FBI tightens the reins

Washington Post: A 164-page follow-up report on the FBI’s past abuse of a powerful terrorism tool can be boiled down to this: Leadership matters.

In 2007, the Justice Department’s inspector general issued a stinging report about the FBI’s excesses regarding national security letters (NSLs), which are used to obtain information in counterintelligence and counterterrorism probes. These letters are most often served on Internet service providers, credit agencies, financial institutions and telecommunications companies and require these businesses to turn over client information such as telephone records and e-mail logs. Unlike the procedure for a search warrant, the FBI may issue an NSL without first getting a judge’s approval. From 2003 through 2006, the bureau issued roughly 200,000 NSLs.

The 2007 inspector general’s report recorded an alarming number of legal violations in obtaining NSLs. In some cases, typographical mistakes led to the collection of information on the wrong people. In others, the FBI obtained from targeted individuals information to which it was not entitled.

Progress noted

In a follow-up report this month, Glenn A. Fine, the Justice Department inspector general, concludes that the FBI has made great strides in repairing the breaches in the NSL system. The reasons: the leadership of Director Robert S. Mueller III and other senior FBI officials who responded to the initial criticism by ordering the bureau to create new safeguards or revamp existing ones to ensure compliance with the law. The report notes that the bureau has incorporated many of the inspector general’s recommendations, including new systems for logging and tracking NSLs, enhanced training for agents to ensure compliance with the law, and more internal checks to catch and report errors.

Mr. Mueller and his team deserve credit for devoting “significant time, energy and resources” and for making “significant progress” toward correcting the NSL problems, according to the recent report. But Mr. Fine and the FBI’s congressional overseers need to remain vigilant. They should continue — as they have vowed to do — to press the bureau for more improvements and more prudence in the use of this powerful tool. After all, the reforms brought about by Mr. Mueller have done nothing to diminish the bureau’s appetite for national security letters.