Originally posted on NextGov.com by Aliya Sternstein

In the first public conference given by the CIA, the agency's head defended the practice of surveilling cyberspace for threats, but questioned the extent to which potent tracking capabilities should be applied.

"If we are to understand the world we cover and to provide our policymakers with the intelligence that they expect, if not demand, we must immerse ourselves in that frontier and adjust our tradecraft accordingly," CIA Director John Brennan said at the event held Wednesday. "In developing powerful tools to meet this challenge, CIA and the community partners face a question that may be unprecedented in our history: If we possess an extraordinary technical capability and are legally authorized to use it, should we necessarily do so?"

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