President Barack Obama is defending U.S. Internet and phone surveillance programs as narrowly targeted efforts that have saved lives. 

During a news conference in Berlin with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Obama said he is confident his government has struck a balance between intelligence gathering and civil liberties.

He said the surveillance program is not “rifling through ordinary emails” of huge numbers of citizens in the United States or elsewhere.

Revelation of the programs has upset Germans wary of government surveillance after the trauma of Nazi Gestapo and East German Stasi secret police. 

Merkel said it is important to continue debate about how to strike “an equitable balance” between providing security and protecting personal freedoms.

Obama agreed, saying, “one of the things that separates us from other governments is we welcome these debates, that is what a democracy is all about.”

Obama said he came into office “committed to protecting the American people, but also committed to our values and our ideals, and one of our highest ideals is civil liberties and privacy.”

A former U.S. intelligence contractor exposed the top-secret U.S. surveillance operations last week. [Read More]

—–
Source: VOA News: Economy and Finance