U.S. News & World Report says that the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board—the “fledgling watchdog agency charged with ensuring U.S. counterterrorism programs do not infringe on civil liberties”—will probe how the NSA a and CIA conduct surveillance under a little-known executive order.

“U.S. spy agencies use Executive Order 12333, issued in 1981, to collect vast amounts of information overseas, including through the direct interception of Internet traffic from cables… The executive order made headlines in July when whistleblower John Napier Tye, formerly a section chief for Internet freedom at the State Department, warned the public it allows for the collection and indefinite retention of large amounts of U.S. Internet communications copied to servers outside the country.”