The NSA has been creating maps of American citizens' social networks similar to how the FBI links organized crime families together

The NSA has been graphing American’s social networks and plotting them as they do organized crime since at least 2010, according to the latest published Edward Snowden leak.

The highly secretive intelligence agency has been mapping out American citizens’ social connections – identifying associates, determining locations, and logging who they talk to – by taking advantage of loosened rules previously meant to restrict surveillance actions.

As far back as November, 2010, the agency authorized spies to conduct ‘large-scale graph analysis on very large sets of communications metadata without having to check foreignness,’ the New York Times revealed Saturday.

The agency augmented that information with bank codes, insurance information, Facebook profiles, passenger manifests, voter registration rolls, property records and tax data, the Times further divulged.

There does not appear to be any restriction on the types of data culled, or who it is gather on, the Times noted.

First disclosed to the Times by NSA leaker Edward Snowden, the documents provided to the paper did not divulge how many Americans were surveilled, nor do the documents  detail who – if anyone – was snagged by the extensive spying.

Asked about the agency’s spying on Americans, an agency spokesperson told the Times that ‘all data queries must include a foreign intelligence justification, period.’

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