US spying comes under fresh attack ©Reuters Former U.S. spy agency contractor Edward Snowden The Obama administration's electronic surveillance came under fresh criticism on Wednesday from senior Democratic and Republican senators, as scepticism about the National Security Agency's collection of phone logs spread on Capitol Hill. The administration tried to defuse some of the criticism by releasing previously classified documents about its spying programmes. But the move came as it faced new disclosures about its collection of internet data. The Guardian on Wednesday published a 32-page presentation about an NSA programme called XKeyscore, which details the agency's "widest reaching" means of gathering data from the internet. The document says NSA analysts are able to analyse internet activity from servers all over the world, including browsing histories, searches and online chats. The details were the latest in a series of disclosures orchestrated by former NSA contactor Edward Snowden that have rocked the administration. In Congress, the most controversial aspect of the surveillance activities has been the mass collection of the phone records of millions of Americans. In an attempt to reassure critics about the safeguards built into the programme, the administration on Wednesday released a secret court order and two reports to Congress. The documents said that the call records, sometimes referred to as telephone metadata, could only be accessed by "appropriately trained and authorised personnel" who have a "reasonable, articulable suspicion" that the telephone number is linked to a suspected foreign terrorist. But the documents did not satisfy critics of the programme. Patrick Leahy, the Vermont Democrat who chairs the Senate judiciary committee, said the evidence suggested the phone data had not thwarted "even several terrorist attacks." "This bulk-collection programme has massive privacy implications," he said. The phone records of all of us in this room reside in an NSA database . . . If this programme is not effective, it has to end. So far, I'm not convinced by what I've seen. After being pressed by Mr Leahy, NSA deputy director John Inglis said that the call logging programme had "contributed" information about 12 terrorist plots, but had been critical in only one case. Chuck Grassley, the senior Republican on the committee, criticised James Clapper, the director of national intelligence, for misleading Congress when he said earlier this year that the government was not collecting data about millions of Americans. Mr Clapper has since apologised for his comments. "Nothing can excuse this kind of behaviour from a senior administration official of any administration, especially on matters of such grave importance," Mr Grassley said. However, Dianne Feinstein, the California Democrat who chairs the Senate intelligence committee, said that the programme should be maintained because it provides information that can help foil terrorist attacks. The senators were speaking at a hearing into the NSA a week after the House of Representatives narrowly defeated by a 217 to 205 vote a proposal to stop funding the telephone data collection programme, with members of both parties voting against the NSA.