Open government group sues for agency wrongdoing records

After receiving little response to Freedom of Information Act requests, the Electronic Frontier Foundation filed suit Wednesday in San Francisco to force the CIA, the National Security Agency and other arms of government to disclose reports of potentially illegal internal activities that they were required to send to the Intelligence Oversight Board or the attorney general during the Bush years, The Associated Press reported.

The EFF also requested reports of misconduct submitted by the FBI, the Director of National Intelligence and the departments of Homeland Security, Defense, Energy and State. According to the AP, the majority of the agencies did not respond to the request. Several that did sent redacted documents.

The National Security Agency, for instance, reportedly provided the EFF with hundreds of blacked out pages showing that dozens of investigations have been launched into potentially illegal activities there. But it was unclear precisely what was investigated, the AP said; NSA claimed FOIA’s national security exemption allow that information to be withheld.