The National Security Agency announced Friday it would end its controversial practice of sweeping up any email or text message an American exchanges with someone overseas that makes reference to a real target of NSA surveillance.

The powerful US spy agency said that although it has the legal power to continue scooping up such communications, it would halt the practice to protect the privacy of US citizens.

"NSA will no longer collect certain internet communications that merely mention a foreign intelligence target," it said in a statement.

The NSA, the country's premier signals intelligence body, is permitted to collect communications of any foreign target, but not that of Americans except in certain situations, or if it gains a warrant to do so.

So far, lawmakers in at least 18 states have proposed legislation that would make it harder to protest, create harsher penalties for protestors who are arrested, and, in two states, remove liability from drivers who accidentally injure protesters on roadways.

Proponents of the bills say they are commonsense measures to ensure public safety after the high-profile protests against the Dakota Access pipeline near Cannonball, North Dakota, and against the police shootings of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri, and of Jamar Clark and Philando Castile in the Minneapolis-Saint Paul, Minnesota, area.

But the trend is alarming to civil rights groups and others who say the measures would trample the public's First Amendment rights.
"Some of these bills are so egregious that you don't need a law degree to conclude they're unconstitutional," said Lee Rowland, an attorney for the American Civil Liberties Union, who has monitored state legislation for more than a decade.
The United Nations has also taken note, releasing a report by the special rapporteur identifying anti-protest bills in 16 states, which the report called "a worrying trend."

Former United Airlines passenger Dr. David Dao is being blamed for his own injuries sustained while being forcibly removed from his seat and dragged down the aisle of the plane.

According to a report released Monday in the Los Angeles Times, the aviation officers attribute the blood dripping down his face to injuries he incurred while being threatening.

Officer James Long alleges, “the subject started swinging his arms up and down with a closed fist. Ofc. Long was able to grab the subject and pull him away from the window seat towards the aisle. But suddenly the subject started flailing and fighting.”

Long claimed that Dao knocked the officer’s arm away, “which caused the subject to fall, hit, and injured his mouth on the armrest on the other side of the aisle.”

Dao is being represented by Chicago personal injury lawyer Thomas Demetrio, who claimed the reports were “utter nonsense.”