FBI retreats from secret request for data

SAN FRANCISCO, May 8 (UPI) -- The FBI withdrew a secret administrative order for data on a patron of a San Francisco digital library as part of a lawsuit settlement, the library said.

As part of the settlement, the FBI dropped a gag order against the Internet Archive and the digital library withdrew its complaint, The Washington Post reported Thursday. The case was unsealed Monday and censored related documents were filed Wednesday.

The archive challenged the national security letter -- an order for information not subject to judicial review and containing a gag order -- based on a Patriot Act provision shielding libraries from NSLs, the Post said.

"We see this as an unqualified success," said Brewster Kahle, the archive's co-founder and digital librarian. "The goal here was to help other recipients of NSLs to understand that you can push back."

The NSL for Internet Archive is one of three known instances in which the FBI retreated from such a demand, the Post said.

"That calls into question how much the FBI needed the information in the first place, and finally, whether the FBI needs this kind of sweeping and unchecked surveillance power," Melissa Goodman, an American Civil Liberties Union staff attorney, told the Post.