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They do not need authorization. Any incursions can be justified as part of the "war against terrorism". If you don't believe me, watch and see. Report back in 2 years, if FR is allowed to exist.

I work in the financial sector. I am well aware of what my company will be required to send to the feds under the Patriot Act - transactions in excess of $10,000. The feds can build the infrastructure, but there is still no provision to provide that machine all credit card transactions - heck, the feds severely limit what a financial company can do with its own data. And, once again, the feds can't even successfully develop systems for the IRS where almost all the data has a common linking key. What on earth makes anyone think they can create a database with every business transaction in the country, from 25 million businesses? How is that data going to be transmitted? Read? Formatted? Merged? Matched? Hint: it won't.

Actually under the proposal of the IAO, it does not require companies to submit to squat; it mandates open systems to warrantless government intrusions without court authorization. In other words, you have to open your systems up with a back door to allow goons to sneak in and out at their desire. As an IT consultant (in the past) also, I can see what they want. Why spend billions on a "database" when you can mandate during "a time of war" that all systems be available to the fedgov without a warrant? They are only going to selectively create a database on the "undesirables" or "suspects". Also they will probably change the data storage requirements on private companies so watch for another tick up on your credit card interest rate. It's brilliant. And damned evil.