Nobody is listening to your phone calls: Obama

The presidents remarks,during a four-day trip to the West Coast,were his first since the revelations this week of programmes to collect information about phone calls and Internet traffic. Obama said the programmes help prevent terrorist attacks and they are kept in check by rigorous judicial and Congressional oversight.

He acknowledged that the public may be uncomfortable with the broad reach of the formerly secret programmes,but he said he believed the government had struck the right balance between the need to fight terrorism and the need to protect privacy.

You cant have 100 percent security and then also have 100 percent privacy and zero inconvenience, Obama said,repeatedly stressing that the lawmakers from both parties and federal judges were aware of the efforts. You know,were going to have to make some choices as a society.

Obama remained silent on Thursday as national security leaks revealed the secret programmes for collecting the information,but on Friday he appeared eager to explain them at length. He dismissed what he called some of the hype from news reports and emphasized the limits on the programmes.

If the intelligence community actually wants to listen to a telephone call,they have to go back to a federal judge, Obama said. He said the collection of information from Internet companies like Google and Apple does not apply to American citizens or people living in the United States.

He repeatedly stressed that the surveillance programmes were subject to Congressional oversight. In fact,he suggested that the programmes which he conceded were classified as top secret were not truly secret because many members of Congress were aware of them.