WASHINGTON, DC (KNX)  -- Phone call records for tens of millions of Americans are currently being collected by the National Security Agency, according to an article in the current issue of USA Today. Those records include calls made only within the borders of the United States.

The article alleges that three major phone companies -- AT&T, Verizon Communications, Inc. and BellSouth Corp. -- have been providing the NSA with material for its database, but it reports the program "does not involve the NSA listening to or recording conversations."

USA Today did not divulge its sources beyond reporting describing them as "people with direct knowledge of the arrangement."

President George W. Bush defends the NSA program of eavesdropping on Americans without a warrant, saying that it only aims to uncover connections between terrorist organizations and their U.S. collaborators. But USA Today says calls originating and terminating within the U.S. have not escaped the attention of the spy agency.

"It's the largest database ever assembled in the world," the paper quotes one source as saying, adding that the agency's goal is "to create a database of every call ever made" within U.S. borders.

President Bush, in a hastily called news conference, stated that intelligence activities he has authorized are lawful and the government does not listen to domestic phone calls without court approval

The paper reports that the National Security Agency has "access to records of billions of domestic calls." Although names and addresses of customers are not being provided, the paper says "the phone numbers the NSA collects can easily be cross-checked with other databases to obtain that information."

President Bush's choice to head the Central Intelligence Agency, General Michael Hayden, was head of the NSA from 1999 through 2005. USA Today named him as the person who would have overseen the call-tracking program.

The paper attempted to contact Hayden, the National Security Agency and the White House, all of whom declined to comment for the article.

USA Today says only one major U.S. telecommunications company, Qwest Communications International, refused to cooperate with the NSA program.