BEIJING, Aug. 22 (Xinhuanet) -- US intelligence officials have released new documents that show the country’s National Security Agency may have unintentionally collected as many as 56,000 emailed communications annually between 2008 and 2011.

The documents include a newly-declassified ruling by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. They were revealed as part of an effort to explain how the NSA spotted, and then fixed, technical problems which led to the inadvertent collection of emails of American citizens without warrants.

The move is the Obama administration’s latest response to continuing controversy over alleged electronic eavesdropping excesses by the NSA. The White House denies that the NSA has a domestic internet surveillance program.

(Source: cntv.cn)