NSA phone data programme called illegal by US privacy board

The US National Security Agency is illegally collecting phone call records from millions of Americans and the program should be stopped, a federal privacy board recommends in a report issued on Thursday.

The five-member Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, created by Congress to protect privacy under post-September 11 anti-terrorism laws, said in a 238-page report that the program has provided only "minimal" help to the US in thwarting other terrorist attacks, according to the report.

This panel has no authority to change the programmes and President Barack Obama last week went ahead, without waiting for Thursday's report, and presented his own plan that doesn't end the use of bulk phone records. Its conclusion presents a public relations challenge for a White House under pressure from phone and Internet companies, foreign governments and civil libertarians after disclosures by former government contractor Edward Snowden of electronic spying by the NSA.