What I'm quoting is not an operations manual, it's the executive summary of the 1st quarter 2012 intelligence oversight report from NSA's internal oversight and

What I'm quoting is not an operations manual, it's the executive summary of the 1st quarter 2012 intelligence oversight report from NSA's internal oversight and compliance section. According to that document, NSA considers it a violation of both EO 12333 and the FISA Amendment Act to target foreigners on US soil. I should have cited a link to EO 12333 [1] in my previous comment; the section that indicates that the FBI has the lead in domestic counterintelligence is section 2.3 (b). I'll admit it's not the most clearly worded, but it does go out of its way to single out the FBI: "Collection within the United States of foreign intelligence not otherwise obtainable shall be undertaken by the FBI or, when significant foreign intelligence is sought, by other authorized agencies of the Intelligence Community, provided that no foreign intelligence collection by such agencies may be undertaken for the purpose of acquiring information concerning the domestic activities of United States persons" The section on the NSA responsibilities (section 1.12(b)) speaks primarily to collecting signals intelligence for foreign intelligence purposes in support of the Department of Defense; it doesn't mention anything about counterintelligence. The FBI is singled out again in 1.14(a) as having the responsibility to conduct domestic counterintelligence. Other parts of the DoD have the responsibity to work with the FBI on matters of domestic counterintelligence (1.12(d)). [1] http://www.archives.gov/federal-register/codification/executive-order/12333.html http://www.archives.gov/federal-register/codification/execut...