WASHINGTON — President Obama will issue new guidelines on Friday to curtail government surveillance, but will not embrace the most far-reaching proposals of his own advisers and will ask Congress to help decide some of the toughest issues, according to people briefed on his thinking. 
 
 Mr. Obama plans to increase limits on access to bulk telephone data, call for privacy safeguards for foreigners and propose the creation of a public advocate to represent privacy concerns at a secret intelligence court. But he will not endorse leaving bulk data in the custody of telecommunications firms, nor will he require court permission for all so-called national security letters seeking business records. 
 
 The emerging approach, described by current and former government officials who insisted on anonymity in advance of Mr. Obama’s widely anticipated speech, suggested a president trying to straddle a difficult line in hopes of placating foreign leaders and advocates of civil liberties without a backlash from national security agencies. The result seems to be a speech that leaves in place many current programs, but embraces the spirit of reform and keeps the door open to changes later. 
 
 The decision to provide additional privacy protections for non-American citizens or residents, for instance, largely codifies existing practices but will be followed by a 180-day study by the director of national intelligence about whether to go further. Likewise, instead of taking the storage of bulk data out of government hands, as recommended by a review panel he appointed, Mr. Obama will leave it in place for now and ask lawmakers to weigh in. 
 
 The blend of decisions, to be outlined in a speech at the Justice Department and in a presidential guidelines memorandum, will be Mr. Obama’s highest-profile response to the disclosures about the National Security Agency made in recent months by Edward J. Snowden, a former N.S.A. contractor who has fled to Russia. 
 
 But as intelligence officials have sorted through Mr. Obama’s evolving position, they have been divided about how significant his adjustments will be. 
 
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 Some officials complained that the changes will add layers of cumbersome procedure that will hinder the hunt for potential terrorists, while others expressed relief that Mr. Obama is not going further and confidence that they could still work within the new guidelines without sacrificing much. 
 
 “Is it cosmetic or is there a real thumb on the scale in a different direction?” asked one former government official who worked on intelligence issues. “That’s the question.” 
 
 The White House said the president’s review is incomplete and would not comment further Tuesday. 
 
 The developments came as the nation’s judiciary waded into the highly charged debate. In a letter made public on Tuesday, a judge designated by Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. to express the views of the judicial branch warned that some changes under consideration would have a negative “operational impact” on a secret foreign intelligence court. 
 
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 Judge John D. Bates, a former chief judge of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, urged Mr. Obama and Congress not to alter the way the court is appointed or to create an independent public advocate to argue against the Justice Department in secret proceedings. Any such advocate, he wrote, should instead be appointed only when the court decided one was needed. 
 
 Judge Bates objected to the workload of requiring that courts approve all national security letters, which are administrative subpoenas allowing the F.B.I. to obtain records about communications and financial transactions without court approval. 
 
 And he raised concerns about greater public disclosure of court rulings, arguing that unclassified summaries would be “likely to promote confusion and misunderstanding.” 
 
 The judge’s letter, versions of which he sent to the leaders of several congressional committees, was released as all five members of Mr. Obama’s surveillance review group testified Tuesday before the Senate Judiciary Committee, seeking support for their recommendations. 
 
 Illustrating the cross-pressures on the president, the advisers argued for the appointment of the independent version of a public advocate, a recommendation the president is expected to follow, though it is not clear how he will structure the position. 
 
 “We admire Judge Bates and respect his views,” said Cass R. Sunstein, of Harvard Law School and a former Obama White House official who served on the review panel. “We respectfully disagree with that one, on the ground that the judge sometimes is not in the ideal position to know whether a particular view needs representation and that in our tradition, standardly, the judge doesn’t decide whether one or another view gets a lawyer.” 
 
 The judge’s objection to the proposal on national security letters dovetailed with that of the F.B.I. director, James B. Comey, who argued it would be inefficient to have to go to a judge each time records were sought. Mr. Obama has decided not to require court approval in every case, but might still require it in some circumstances, according to one administration official. 
 
 Mr. Obama will cut back on the number of people whose phone records can be examined by the N.S.A. through its bulk data program. Currently the agency can scrutinize call records of people as far as three steps, or “hops,” removed from a suspect. Mr. Obama’s review panel proposed limiting searches to people just two steps removed. He is also likely to cut down the number of years such data can be retained; currently it is deleted after five years. 
 
 But the president will not, at least for now, back the panel’s suggestion that telecommunications firms keep such data and that the government be allowed to tap into those databases only when necessary. 
 
 Intelligence officials complained it would be inefficient to have to go to multiple companies, so some officials proposed creating an independent consortium to store the data instead. 
 
 Mr. Obama has decided against keeping the data at the private providers because they do not want that responsibility, officials said, and no independent consortium currently exists. As a result, he will ask Congress to work with him to determine the best way to store the data. 
 
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 He also appears likely to reject the idea of separating code breakers and code makers. Some critics of the N.S.A. were disturbed that the agency’s encryption team charged with bolstering online security systems against hackers was working with the team that tries to penetrate computer systems used by terrorists. 
 
 The letter by Judge Bates was accompanied by 15 pages of often specific comments about possible surveillance reforms. 
 
 It is highly unusual for judges to weigh in on public policy debates involving the other two branches of government, but Judge Bates, the director of the Administrative Office of the United States Court, said that Chief Justice Roberts had designated him to “act as a liaison” and that he had consulted other judges. 
 
 The judge emphasized that his comments were meant to address smooth operation of the court and were “not intended as expressions of support or opposition to particular introduced bills.” 
 
 Still, his comments went beyond workload issues. He objected to a proposal by Mr. Obama’s review group to take away Chief Justice Roberts’s sole power to appoint the 11 judges of the surveillance court and have them picked instead by the chief judges of the appeals courts. 
 
 Ten of the 11 current judges were appointed by Republican presidents, and critics have called for more diversity. “The chief justice is uniquely positioned to select qualified judges,” Judge Bates argued. ||||| President Barack Obama’s speech today marks a historic step in the continuing discussion of national security, privacy and government surveillance. 
 
 The speech was delivered against a background set by numerous proposals, including various bills in Congress and the recommendations of the president’s Review Group on Intelligence and Communications Technologies, on which I served (and most of whose recommendations were endorsed in today’s speech). Seven points in the speech deserve particular attention. 
 
 First, the president called for an end to the government’s current storage of “metadata,” information about many millions of calls made by ordinary Americans. (This includes information about the time and date of calls, and the numbers involved; it doesn’t include any content.) He emphasized that the capacity to search metadata is one that must be preserved, but without government itself holding it. 
 
 Some people, including members of the Review Group, have proposed that metadata should be held by the phone companies (which have it in any case) or by a new, private entity. The central argument is that government storage contains risks to personal privacy, civil liberties and public trust, and it isn’t necessary for national security purposes (so long as government can obtain access to the information if it shows a need to do so). 
 
 The transition to private ownership creates challenges. The phone companies are aggressively resisting this proposal, which they say would impose serious economic and operational burdens on them. The president directed the U.S. attorney general and the intelligence community to report on the best way to transfer the metadata out of government hands, before the program comes up for reauthorization on March 28. 
 
 Second, the president announced that in this transition period, the government shouldn’t have access to metadata without judicial approval. As a matter of principle, and unless there is an emergency, public officials should have access to the content of people’s telephone calls only if an independent judge has authorized that access. 
 
 Third, the president endorsed the proposal to appoint a public advocate to represent privacy and civil liberties interests before the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. In recent years, the court has been asked to assess some fundamental questions of statutory and constitutional law. At least in significant cases, the president concluded that it is important to have a genuine adversary proceeding, including a team of lawyers whose mission is to protect privacy and civil liberties. Obama also called for an increase in declassification of the court’s opinions. 
 
 Fourth, the president imposed new measures to safeguard the privacy of non-Americans, including foreign leaders. He emphasized that when the U.S. collects information abroad, its goal is to protect national security, not to monitor ordinary conversations, to intrude into private lives, or to track people solely on the basis of their political convictions or religious beliefs. 
 
 Importantly, he announced that he would extend privacy safeguards for American citizens to people overseas, limiting how long information can be held and when it can be disseminated. He also directed that without a compelling national security purpose, the U.S. won’t monitor the communications of leaders of our close friends and allies. 
 
 Fifth, he announced that communications providers, including telephone companies, would be able to disclose more information about the orders they have received to provide data to the government. The companies have argued strongly for this proposal, in part on the ground that it will show that these orders aren’t common, and that providers are rarely turning over private information to officials. 
 
 Sixth, the president called for more transparency with respect to National Security letters, which allow the Federal Bureau of Investigation, without court approval, to obtain access to people’s records (such as their bank and credit card information). He stopped short of endorsing the Review Group’s recommendation that the FBI shouldn’t be able to obtain records without judicial authorization. 
 
 Seventh, the president announced the coming appointment of a White House official with the specific responsibility of carrying out the new privacy safeguards. 
 
 Notwithstanding the importance of today’s speech, it is hardly the end of the process. Some of the president’s judgments, including the transition of the metadata program, can’t be implemented without congressional action. On these questions, the usual divisions between Republicans and Democrats are confounded, and both alliances and splits have been surprising and unpredictable. The unpredictability creates real challenges, but it also provides promising opportunities for sensible reform. 
 
 (Cass R. Sunstein, the Robert Walmsley University professor at Harvard Law School, is a Bloomberg View columnist. He is a former administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, the co-author of “Nudge” and author of “Conspiracy Theories and Other Dangerous Ideas,” forthcoming in March.) 
 
 To contact the writer of this article: Cass R. Sunstein at csunstei@law.harvard.edu. 
 
 To contact the editor responsible for this article: Katy Roberts at kroberts29@bloomberg.net. ||||| President Barack Obama made clear Friday that he has no intention of stopping the daily collection of phone records from millions of Americans, but he promised "appropriate reforms" to how such surveillance is carried out. 
 
 President Barack Obama rubs his eye as he listens to a question from a reporter during a news conference in the East Room of the White House in Washington, Friday, Aug. 9, 2013. The president said the... (Associated Press) 
 
 In an afternoon news conference, the president acknowledged the domestic spying has troubled Americans and hurt the country's image abroad. But Obama blamed the damage on misinformation stemming from leaks to the news media. 
 
 "Understandably, people would be concerned," the president said. "I would be, too, if I weren't inside the government." 
 
 But he assured Americans that the surveillance is not being abused, and he described the phone program as "an important tool" that keeps America safe. 
 
 "It's not enough for me to have confidence in these programs," Obama said. "The American people have to have confidence in them as well." 
 
 Every day, the National Security Agency sweeps up the phone records of all Americans. The program was authorized under the USA Patriot Act, which Congress hurriedly passed after 9/11. The NSA says phone records are the only things it collects in bulk under that law. But officials have left open the possibility that it could create similar databases of people's credit card transactions, hotel records and Internet searches. 
 
 The changes Obama endorsed include: formation of an outside advisory panel to review U.S. surveillance powers; assigning a privacy officer at the National Security Agency; and the creation of an independent attorney to argue against the government before the nation's surveillance court. 
 
 All those new officials would carry out most of their duties in secret. 
 
 Obama's news conference comes at the end of a summer that forced the administration into an unexpected debate over domestic surveillance. The debate began when former government contract systems analyst Edward Snowden leaked classified documents exposing NSA programs that store years of phone records on every American. 
 
 That revelation prompted the most significant reconsideration yet of the vast surveillance powers Congress granted the president after 9/11 attacks. 
 
 Obama has found Congress surprisingly hostile to those powers since they were made public. The telephone program narrowly survived a 217-205 vote in the House to dismantle it. An unusual coalition of libertarian-leaning conservatives and liberal Democrats pose a challenge to Obama, who has aligned himself with establishment Republicans and Congress' pro-security lawmakers. 
 
 The administration says it only looks at the phone records when investigating suspected terrorists. But testimony before Congress revealed how easy it is for Americans with no connection to terrorism to unwittingly have their calling patterns analyzed by the government. 
 
 When the NSA identifies a suspect, it can conduct three "hops." That means analysts can look not just at the suspect's phone records, but also at the records of everyone he calls, everyone who calls those people and everyone who calls those people. 
 
 If the average person called 40 unique people, three-hop analysis would allow the government to mine the records of 2.5 million Americans when investigating one suspected terrorist.
– President Obama used his usual soaring rhetoric yesterday in announcing changes to the NSA surveillance program, but the journalist behind many of the Edward Snowden scoops doesn't think they'll amount to much. Sure, some of the proposals have merit—putting a public advocate on the FISA court, removing the control of metadata from the NSA—but even if all are adopted, they will do very little to end the NSA's practice of "suspicion-less spying aimed at hundreds of millions of people in the US and around the world," writes Glenn Greenwald in the Guardian. He doesn't sound surprised, though, summing up the ways of Obama with a particularly scathing passage: "He prettifies the ugly; he drapes the banner of change over systematic status quo perpetuation; he makes Americans feel better about policies they find repellent without the need to change any of them in meaningful ways. He's not an agent of change but the soothing branding packaging for it." Greenwald's silver lining: Public criticism forced this "first step," and continued pressure might eventually make it clear to DC that "cosmetic gestures are plainly inadequate." Click to read his full column. The ACLU, meanwhile, praises some of the proposals but adds that" the president should end—not mend—the government’s collection and retention of all law-abiding Americans’ data." At Bloomberg, Cass Sunstein, who was on the president's advisory panel for the reforms, lays out his seven key takeaways. He, too, emphasizes that much work remains, calling the speech a "historic step in the continuing discussion of national security, privacy and government surveillance."