A proposal to restrict the US government' collection of private telephone data in the wake of worldwide scandal cleared another hurdle Thursday with backing from a second congressional committee. The House of Representatives' intelligence committee gave its approval to the same bill approved unanimously Wednesday by the chamber's judiciary committee, dpa reported. At issue is the National Security Agency (NSA)'s massive collection of intelligence data that for years scooped up nearly all telephone metadata - records of who was calling whom and when. The measure now faces a vote by the full House, agreement by the Senate and signature by US President Barack Obama, who suggested many of the reform measures contained in the bill. The proposed reform would ban the NSA from collecting massive metadata on American phone calls. Revelations about that programme provoked international outrage last year. -- SPA 00:12 LOCAL TIME 21:12 GMT تغريد
