Newport Daily News (Newport,RI) Has A Report on PATRIOT. Area librarians report no government attempts to access local patrons’ records, a power provided by the USA Patriot Act.
But if they had received any FBI inquiries or Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act warrants, the librarians couldn’t tell anyone, anyway.
Secrecy surrounds any surveillance the government undertakes in the name of national security. If the FBI serves a local librarian with a national security letter, basically a subpoena to access patron records, the librarian must comply and may not disclose the order.
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