Today, President Obama delivered an address announcing reforms to the NSA's domestic surveillance programs. Following a deluge of leaks concerning the NSA's domestic operations, President Obama created an advisory panel to review the NSA programs and submit policy reforms. With those recommendations in mind, the President has issued a policy directive that ends the bulk metadata collection program.
While the presidential policy directive addresses bulk metadata collection that operates under Section 215 of the Patriot Act, it does not address other programs that operate under Section 215 or programs such as PRISM that operate under the authority of other laws. One of the most notable policy recommendations from the advisory panel that the President did not accept was the prohibition of demanding information on individuals from companies, such as telecoms, through national security letters without first acquiring court approval.
For more on the #NSAspeech, see this New York Times article.
