NSA head: Surveillance helped thwart more than 50 terror plots: Intelligence officials said Tuesday that the government’s sweeping surveillance efforts have helped thwart 50 potential “terrorist events” since the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, and the officials revealed two new examples for the first time.
In testimony before the House Intelligence Committee on Tuesday, officials cited a nascent plot to blow up the New York Stock Exchange and a case involving an individual providing financial support to an overseas terrorist group.
“In recent years these programs, together with other intelligence, have protected the U.S. and our allies from terrorist threats across the globe to include helping prevent the terrorist — the potential terrorist events over 50 times since 9/11,” National Security Agency Director Gen. Keith Alexander told the House Intelligence Committee.
