That's one of the key questions President Obama is asking as he looks to put in new rules and guidelines for the National Security Agency. All of this comes on the heels of months-long revelations made by former NSA contractor about the wide net cast by the NSA.
Here to offer his perspective is Michael Ratner, he's President Emeritus of the Center for Constitutional Rights and the attorney for Julian Assange and Wikileaks.
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Ratner tells host Rob Sachs, "What we're going to see happening and what we see happening in Washington already is that a panel made a series of suggestions to Obama about what ought to be done with the NSA and spying. Most of those have not been taken up by the administration so far, the more radical ones of those. And you also have a congressional bill floating through, and what I fear here most is that we're going to see a bunch of reforms come out that don't really get to the problem but will try and make the problem go away for the United States and for the NSA. And I think without real transparency on what they're doing and what remains that we're going to see an effort to lessen the tension around the NSA and the president and to let the NSA more or less continue what it's doing without giving us the real change we need."
http://voiceofrussia.com/us/2014_01_11/Assange-lawyer-skeptical-Obama-will-reform-NSA-3567/