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The government claims that these security programs are necessary for our safety, and have cited over 50 examples wherein terrorist plots were discovered and stopped due to this surveillance. However, opponents have debunked at least some of these claims, which have been either exaggerated, or were primarily stopped via traditional law enforcement methods.

Are there any publicly known cases of a credible terrorist attack that was discovered or stopped because of large-scale wiretapping/traffic analysis/etc. playing an essential role, without which the plot would not have been discovered or stopped?

For the purposes of answering, if a plot was initially discovered by one of these surveillance programs, it will be assumed that it would not have been discovered otherwise, unless there is other evidence indicating that there was another lead from elsewhere.

Bigbio2002
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    What do you mean by solely? How are you judging causation? Are you using a but-for test? What about concurrent causes, one of which was the NSA program? Or two causes that either alone would have been sufficient? –  Jun 27 '13 at 21:46
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    It’s relevant here to note the distinction between targeted wire-tapping after a specific court order had been obtained – which has always been legal – and large-scale, unspecific wire-tapping, as done under Prism and related programs. The government wants to demonstrate the need for the latter but as far as I can see, so far they’ve only shown cases for the former. – Konrad Rudolph Jun 27 '13 at 22:02
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    "Soley" meaning that the very act of wire-tapping prevented an attack? That seems rather impossible. – Flimzy Jun 28 '13 at 01:13

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As far as I know there has only been one successful "plot" foiled, involving a San Diego cab driver who gave $8,500 to an al-Qaeda affiliate(archive.org version). Note that the source may have some bias even though it claims to be nonpartisan.

John Lyon
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Matt Buffo
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