Caller ID Not Getting Any Clearer

By: Vaughn Ververs
Topics: In The News

(AP / CBS)

After a week of carefully worded and laboriously parsed statements, BellSouth has asked the USA Today to retract "false and unsubstantiated" statements it says the paper made in its story a week ago which reported on an NSA program to compile a database of the phone calls of "tens of millions" of Americans. USA Today's Jim Drinkard reports today the company asked for the retraction in an letter to editor Craig Moon. In the letter:

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."

A spokesman for the paper said the letter is being reviewed and will be responded to. Meanwhile, Drinkard notes that BellSouth was informed of the details of the story before publication:

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."

All three companies have, to varying degrees, denied participation in the reported database collection but statements on all sides have been carefully broken down and examined. Some reports indicate that the calling data referred to in the USA Today report was focused on long-distance calls, not local calls. Whether that would constitute "tens of millions" or add up to "the largest database ever assembled in the world" – descriptions included in the original story – is unclear. What does appear more clear a week after the report appeared is that we have a lot more to learn before we know exactly what this story is all about.

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by shamrocker6 May 21, 2006 1:51 AM EDT: Can you picture all those ?%*& executives in their Board Rooms wringing their hands while their high-priced law firms come-up with the most sterilized statements of denial for the public to laugh at? It amazes me how Washington and all the other Giants still cling to the idea that if the lie is clever enough, then the little guy will buy it. Hello!!; Reply to this comment


by a_12 May 19, 2006 7:14 PM EDT: this is called free publicity and advertising, not news. jeez. i hope that some form of paperwork shows up otherwise i'm going to be real pissed that i read this article claiming it's news. propoganda and poppycock.; Reply to this comment


by alphaa10-2009 May 19, 2006 5:46 PM EDT: This BellSouth quasi-denial left me laughing, too, "You have offered no proof" is hardly a denial. Or don't the bozos at BellSouth understand that? Even a PR cretin can grasp you must state your denial in the strongest terms-- ie. "Did NOT!" (Did too!) "Did NOT, NOT, NOT!?" The BellSouth attempt at denial comes across as an affirmation. But maybe their PR stuff is weirder after passing through some internal filtering at NSA. Isn't BellSouth some sort of communications company, or do they just do outsource work for the government?; Reply to this comment


by atyndall-2009 May 19, 2006 1:09 PM EDT: Yes, don't you love non-denial denials? "You have offered no proof that BellSouth provided massive calling data to the NSA as part of a warrantless program..." From this, are we to infer that "massive calling data" was indeed provided as part of a separate program, not the "warrantless" one? "BellSouth does not provide any confidential customer information to the NSA or any governmental agency without proper legal authority." From this are we to infer that customer information that is not "confidential" --- in other words calling logs from billing records -- has indeed been provided "without proper legal authority"? And people thought Bill Clinton was slick... Cheers Andrew Tyndall; Reply to this comment