&gt; Why is it &quot;patently absurd&quot; to retain a window of such data for<p>He said it was &quot;patently absurd&quot; to pretend that they haven&#x27;t &quot;captured&quot; any data until someone searches for it.<p>&gt; long enough to identify the communications of interest and discard the rest?<p>I have no reason to think that they wouldn&#x27;t keep all of it, forever, period.  Or at least retain a long enough window to render this statement pointless.<p>&gt; Is there an alternative?<p>Old fashioned police work?  Only gather data with a warrant?