Yesterday's revelations that the September leak of an intercepted Osama bin Laden video prompted al-Qaida to close a loophole that allowed surveillance on the group have sparked an official inquiry.
A Washington, D.C.-based private firm that monitors al-Qaida communications, SITE Intelligence Group, had secretly gotten a copy of the video and shared it with the White House. Within hours, SITE argues, multiple government agencies had downloaded the video and it was all over the media -- leaked from the government sources.
SOURCE: White House website -- Question: Fran, can I just follow up a little bit on that, and I think Dana said this morning the leak did not come from the White House. How do you know that?
MS. TOWNSEND: Well, we do know that the -- we understand that within -- God knows, we'll learn more as time goes on, but I understand that the link to the SITE was provided to the intelligence community, and the concern was that that link is the piece that -- was the thing that was made public. So, as I say, I mean, obviously, I'm not -- we here at the White House are unable to conduct an investigation, and I leave this to the Director of National Intelligence to ascertain what's the appropriate way of dealing with this and understanding what happened, so we can ensure it doesn't happen again.
SOURCE: Washington Post -- A German man who says he was abducted and tortured by the CIA as part of the anti-terrorism rendition program lost his final chance Tuesday to persuade U.S. courts to hear his claims.
The Supreme Court rejected without comment an appeal from Khaled el-Masri, effectively endorsing Bush administration arguments that state secrets would be revealed if courts allowed the case to proceed.
The U.S. government has neither confirmed nor denied el-Masri's account and, in urging the court not to hear the case, said that the facts central to el-Masri's claims "concern the highly classified methods and means of the program."
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