On midnight of November 29th, the NSA stopped its bulk collection of telephony metadata once authorized under Section 215 of the USA Patriot Act. Under the USA Freedom Act, which Congress passed in June, the agency was required to reform its phone records program, creating a mechanism by which the data would be stored locally with the phone providers and searchable only after receiving an order from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) for a "specific selection term."

Here's a brief update on my piece yesterday on the Klayman litigation. The government yesterday, as promised, moved in the D.C. Circuit for a stay of Judge Leon's ruling.

Judge Richard Leon of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia has issued an injunction against the NSA's bulk metadata collection program in his ruling in Klayman v. Obama, ruling that the plantiffs "are likely to have standing to challenge the constitutionality" of the program.

You can read the full opinion below:

The D.C. Circuit has spoken in Obama v. Klayman—the constitutional challenge to the just-winding-down bulk metadata program—and it has announced its refusal to speak on the subject.