Document 24: Statement for the Record of NSA Director Lt Gen Michael V. Hayden, USAF before the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, April 12, 2000

In a rare public appearance by the NSA director, Lt. Gen. Michael Hayden outlines the regulatory safeguards and oversight mechanisms that are in place to ensure that the agency's electronic surveillance mission does not infringe upon the privacy of U.S. persons, and to respond to recent allegations that NSA provides intelligence information to U.S. companies.

The agency may only target the communications of U.S. persons within the United States after obtaining a federal court order suggesting that the individual might be "an agent of a foreign power." The number of such cases have been "very few" since the passage of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act in 1978. In cases where the NSA wishes to conduct electronic surveillance on U.S. persons overseas, the agency must first obtain the approval of the Attorney General, who must have probable cause to believe that the individual "is an agent of a foreign power, or a spy, terrorist, saboteur, or someone who aides or abets them." With regard to the unintentional collection of communications to, from, or about U.S. citizens, Hayden stresses that such information is not retained "unless the information is necessary to understand a particular piece of foreign intelligence or assess its importance."

In response to other allegations, Hayden asserts that NSA cannot request that another country "illegally" collect intelligence on U.S. persons on their behalf, and also that the agency "is not authorized to provide signals intelligence information to private U.S. companies."

Document 27: Statement for the Record by Lieutenant General Michael V. Hayden, Director, National Security Agency/Central Security Service Before the Joint Inquiry of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, October 17, 2002, Unclassified

Hayden, in his testimony to the joint committee intelligence performance prior to the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington of September 11, 2001, addresses three major questions: what did NSA know prior to September 11, what did NSA learn in retrospect, and what had NSA done in response? In his conclusions, Hayden addresses a number of issues - including the relationship between SIGINT and law enforcement, and the line between the government's need for counterterrorism information and the privacy interests of individuals residing in the United States.