IT IS THE MASKED MEN'S PRESENCE IN THE REPORTS THAT IS THE SMOKING GUN:

First: A US citizen's name appearing in an intelligence report does not mean that person was the target of a surveillance operation. They're more likely to have been on the other end of a phone call or email with a foreign national, one that the intelligence community believes to have some sort of value, and received clearance under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to surveil. People like, say, the sort of diplomats and foreign officials with whom the Trump transition team would have communicated extensively. It's known as "incidental collection," and it's both totally legal and completely unsurprising.

In cases of incidental collection under FISA, the agency who garnered the material automatically "masks" the names of any US citizens. Masking provides an important Fourth Amendment safeguard--but it's also not an inalienable right.

"The most commonly used standard by which a national security official can ask for a US person named to be unmasked is: Is the identity necessary to understand the foreign intelligence value of the information?" says Carrie Cordero, a national security lawyer who has worked directly on FISA process issues.

Frequently, it is. According to a the intelligence community's 2016 transparency report, in 2015 the NSA issued 4,290 reports that included identifying information about US citizens under FISA's Section 702, which allows for surveillance of non-US individuals. In 1,122 of those cases, the agency ultimately unmasked the information.

"This is a standard practice," says Elizabeth Goitein, co-director of the Brennan Center for Justice's Liberty and National Security Program.

There's nothing inherently suspicious about incidental collection, and unmasking happens with decent regularity. The only potential scandal that could erupt from some such practices would relate to who requested the unmasking, and why? Which brings us to Susan Rice.

Masked Marauders

It's easy enough to see how a senior Obama administration official requesting the unmasking of Trump associates could cause a tempest. But less so when you consider the specific associate.

"The national security advisor, every day, as part of the National Security Council, gets a compilation of intelligence reports every morning," says Goitein. "To the extent that the reports include US person information that has been masked, per standard procedure, you would certainly expect the people who received those reports to be among the people who are requesting the unmasking."

That aligns with a brief interview Rice gave to NBC's Andrea Mitchell. "There were occasions when I would receive a report in which a US person was referred to, name not provided," Rice said. "Sometimes in that context in order to understand the importance of that report, and assess its significance, it was necessary to find out or request the information as to who that US official was."

All of which, again, isn't just legal. It's routine, especially for someone in Rice's position at the time.

"There's certainly nothing illegal about it," says Cordero. "The decision to request an unmask is a judgment call based on an individual's national security responsibilities, and their need to understand the context."

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