A federal judge has ruled that the U.S. National Security Agency's bulk phone record metadata collection efforts are legal, turning aside a lawsuit the American Civil Liberties Union brought against the agency. Although the collection program "vacuums up information about virtually every call to, from, or within the United States," it also allows the NSA to "detect relationship so attenuated and ephemeral they would otherwise escape notice," Judge William Pauley III wrote in his 54-page decision filed today in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.