Former NSA Director Hayden: We Did Not Break Rules

Former NSA Director General Michael Hayden (Ret) spoke to Newsmax.com about the flap over NSA's surveillance program.

Former NSA Director Michael Hayden denied reports that the agency has repeatedly broken privacy rules or exceeded its legal authority in an exclusive interview with Newsmax late Friday.

"If, at any step in the data-collection process, you discover that the signal you're working is a protected signal, you've got to stop," Hayden, a retired Air Force general who directed the National Security Agency from 1999 to 2005, told Newsmax in the interview. "At each step, you've got that requirement: Is this or is this not a communication of someone who is protected by the Fourth Amendment?"

 Based on information provided earlier this summer by former NSA secrets leaker Edward Snowden, The Washington Post published details of an internal audit on Friday that purportedly showed the agency overstepped its authority thousands of times since Congress granted it broad new powers in 2008.

"If, at any step in that process, you think you have a protected communication, you stop and you report it," Hayden countered.
You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/Hayden-Newsmax-NSA-Audit/2013/08/16/id/520888?s=al&promo_code=148EB-1

Note: According to the report, many of the errors were simply typos and cases of overseas suspects bringing their cell phones onto U.S. soil.

I'm not against further oversight of NSA, but I fear that too much oversight and undue criticism of the surveillance program will hamper their important mission - which is to keep Americans safe.

The above NSA photo is an aerial shot of NSA headquarters in Maryland.