Vice President Dick Cheney fired a stern rebuke on Friday to journalists after the disclosure of a secret program that combed a massive array of international banking transactions searching for terrorist ties, reports NYT.

The effort was effected after Americans approached a Belgium banking cooperative, known as Swift, following the 9/11 attacks. Most alarmingly to some observers, the large quantities of data were obtained by broad administrative subpoenas for swaths of transactions and individuals, rather than on a case-by-case basis.

The kicker to today’s article in The Times, “Cheney Assails Press on Report on Bank Data,” however, lies in the very last two paragraphs.

“But the Treasury secretary, Mr. Snow, said Friday that after the Sept. 11 attacks, Treasury Department officials initially presented the cooperative with what he described as “really narrowly crafted subpoenas all tied to terrorism.” Officials at Swift responded that that they did not have the ability to “extract the particular information from their broad database.”

“So they said, ‘We’ll give you all the data,’ ” Secretary Snow said.”

It seems then for now the tarnished facet of the Swift program is less a matter of concern for civil liberty watchdogs, and more so a result of the exigencies of the data set.

Either way, one more broadly reaching secret intelligence program to add to the pile.

Previously: US Trolled Bank Records

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