William Binney, who worked for the National Security Agency for 40 years, quit after 911 had moved his employer to what he felt was excessive snooping on American citizens. He believes that all phone companies, and not just Verizon are involved in turning over records of calls to the NSA.

The surprise to many of those reporting on this issue of monitoring phone data is that it has continued and has drastically increased since Bush left office.

An internet surveillance program called PRISM, started in 2007 under Bush, and has also massively increased during the reign of  Obama. A report by another whistle blower reveals that internet giants Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, Pal Talk, AOL, Skype, YouTube, and Apple are submitting to government snooping into the private data of their users. Apple is said not to have joined this effort until 2012,  after Steve Jobs had died. Perhaps this was part of the reason for the government attacks on the company.  Microsoft was purportedly the first company to jump  on board with the program.
The threat of lawsuits and “regulation” from the government has been enough to secure compliance from the companies.
Spokesmen from these companies continue to deny knowledge of government access to their databases.

It is interesting to watch some of the leftie media outlets responding to the idea that the government has been monitoring their private communications and internet activities, and that the Obama administration appears to have vastly increased the scope of the snooping.  This appears to have really gotten their attention.