CAIRO, May 11, 2006 (IslamOnline.net) – The US has been secretly building a database containing phone call records of billions of domestic phone calls as part of the controversial domestic spying program, a leading American daily said Thursday, May 11.

"It's the largest database ever assembled in the world," one source told USA Today, declining to be identified by name or affiliation.

He said the National Security Agency's goal is "to create a database of every call ever made" within US borders using records provided by AT&T Inc., Verizon Communications Inc. and BellSouth Corp.

Despite serious concerns by top lawmakers, US President George Bush nominated on Monday, May 8, General Michael Hayden, who supervised the controversial domestic spying program, to be the new CIA director.

Bush has defended an executive order he signed in 2002 allowing eavesdropping without warrants, saying it was limited only to monitoring international phone and e-mail communications linked to people with connections to Al-Qaeda.

"In other words," Bush explained, "one end of the communication must be outside the United States."