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The National Security Agency has reportedly asked for a criminal inquiry into leaks of classified information as Britain's Foreign Secretary defends cooperation with U.S. intelligence activities.

The president faces criticism in the wake of new revelations on the NSA. Weekend Edition Sunday host Rachel Martin talks to NPR's Mara Liasson about the political impact of the revelations about the NSA's data collection.

Weekend Edition Sunday host Rachel Martin talks with Noah Shachtman, editor of the national security blog at Wired Magazine, about whether Big Data is ever too big to use.

Weekend Edition Sunday host Rachel Martin talks with NPR's Dina Temple-Raston about National Intelligence Director James Clapper's statement that NSA surveillance is "fully debated and authorized by Congress."

Revelations this week that the National Security Agency has been running an extensive domestic surveillance program involving companies like Google, Facebook and Apple has caused many Americans to ask what's left of their privacy. Guest host Tess Vigeland speaks with James Fallows, national correspondent with The Atlantic.

Director of National Intelligence James Clapper says recent reporting by The Guardian and The Washington Post, among others, threatens to give terrorists a 'playbook' for thwarting detection.

The Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board is tasked with making sure that secret government surveillance programs aren't abused. It was created in 2004, but still doesn't even have a website or email.

The news that the National Security Agency has been collecting reams of telephone data and internet surfing both at home and abroad has rattled civil liberties groups. Amid the concerns about privacy and possible abuse, the revelations are an indication of something important: the intelligence community's move into the new frontier of Big Data.

Even in a starkly polarized era, there are still some issues that can draw together Americans from across the political spectrum and scramble ideological fault lines.

In his most extensive comments so far on revelations about the electronic data that the nation's spy agencies are collecting, the president also said that the programs "help us prevent terrorist attacks." He said "modest encroachments on privacy" are being balanced against national security.