This video is a very good example of parsing. Obviously a court order is not part of a <i>technical</i> system, it is part of a <i>human</i> system.<p>The UK intercepts US citizens data in N. America as a loophole in our laws, using ECHELON. The the NSA is given access to the data they collect with U.S. equipment on their soil. This has been ongoing since before the World Wide Web existed.<p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECHELON" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECHELON</a>