Obama to Limit Data Collection by Intelligence Agencies

Intelligence agencies will have to delete extraneous data on private citizens and limit storage of data on foreigners to five years, the Obama administration is expected to announce Tuesday, as part of a new batch of modest restrictions on intelligence gathering efforts.

The reforms will also initiate regular White House reviews over surveillance programs targeting foreign leaders, the New York Times reports. President Barack Obama abruptly cancelled one such program targeting German Chancellor Angela Merkel in 2013, after leaked documents revealed that the National Security Agency had tapped her cell phone records.

However, the administration stopped short of addressing the scope of the NSA’s collection of “metadata” on cell phone records, which sparked a controversy after it was revealed that the program encompassed millions of Americans’ cell phone records.

Read more at the New York Times.