The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) sets forth procedures for the surveillance and collection of foreign intelligence information.

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In 1978, after Congressional investigations of the CIA, Congress passed the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which set up a secret, special court inside the Justice Department to issue warrants for this kind of spying.

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The core piece of controversial legislation is the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which became law in 1978.

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Last week FBI Assistant Director John Miller said that most of the 2, 176 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act search warrants approved in 2006 were used against terror suspects inside the US. Three days later, the FBI announced the arrest of the members of an American and Caribbean terror cell that was plotting to bomb JFK International Airport.

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Preventing roving wiretaps: The Patriot Act allows federal officials, pursuant to Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) Court authority, to track the telecommunications of suspected terrorists, despite their efforts to defeat such monitoring by changing phones or service providers.

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And that is: if the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which is the statute in question, as applied to the specific facts and circumstances of the NSA program, unconstitutionally -and these are the Supreme Court's words - impairs the ability of the president to protect our nation against attack, then that part of the statute itself is unconstitutional.

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The surveillance court, made up of 11 judges from across the nation, was created in 1978 by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).

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