Several Pittsburgh-based peace groups want to know if they are being spied on by the government.

The American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania yesterday filed a federal Freedom of Information Act request to the Pentagon on behalf of those organizations.

The request seeks information on what, if any, surveillance is being done by the Department of Defense on local peace activists and protest groups in light of recent news reports that the federal government is spying on citizens.

"It's not people who are dangerous, it's people who disagree," said Witold Walczak, legal director of the ACLU of Pennsylvania. "We want to understand the extent of the Pentagon spying and then get some kind of reasonable restrictions back in place.

"Without restrictions, the government begins to view dissent as disloyalty," Mr. Walczak said. "For a nation committed to freedom of expression and thought, that's really unacceptable."

Allegations that the Defense Department is spying on protest groups came to light through an NBC News report that aired in December. The network obtained pages from a secret Pentagon database that lists anti-war and other protest groups and their activities.

Among the organizations listed is one from Pittsburgh. Though it does not identify the group, the sheet does list an incident date of April 27, 2005, and that the group's activity "targets military recruiting."

The ACLU of Pennsylvania has requested information on behalf of Pittsburgh Organizing Group; the Thomas Merton Center; the Anti-War Committee; CODEPINK Pittsburgh; Pittsburgh Raging Grannies; Pittsburgh Bill of Rights Defense Campaign and the Save Our Civil Liberties Campaign.

Pittsburgh Organizing Group was founded in 2002. Its Web site describes it as a "progressive group concerned with peace, social and economic justice, and environmental issues locally, nationally, and internationally."

Among the events it has sponsored are protests and rallies outside local military recruiting stations.

Mike Healey, an attorney who has represented POG members, said none of the organization's demonstrations has been anything other than peaceful.

POG is one of the groups listed in the Threat and Local Observation Notice reporting system, called TALON, adopted for use by the Defense Department after the Sept. 11 attacks.

It is a simple database designed to be the formal repository for various intelligence and law enforcement agencies to share "non-validated domestic threat information ... and security anomalies indicative of possible terrorist pre-attack activities."

A Pentagon spokesman yesterday said the department was not conducting surveillance. Instead, he said, "any information contained in TALON is reported [or given] to us by concerned citizens, Department of Defense personnel ... or law enforcement agencies."

Mr. Walczak said the current program of spying by the Pentagon is reminiscent of what was done throughout the 1950s, '60s and '70s.

"One would hope that the Pentagon would have better things to do than spy on people who protest government policy," he said.

He claims that since the Sept. 11 attacks, the Bush administration has done away with most of the rules in place since the 1970s that protected Americans from such activity. Those protections, Mr. Walczak said, have been eroded by changes within the Departments of Justice and Defense, through executive orders and with changes to internal agency regulations.

Mr. Walzcak said the level of surveillance occurring now in the United States did not exist under the Clinton administration. He added, though, that it's a different world now.

"Life really changed after Sept. 11. There clearly is a significant threat to this country, and it's one the government should address," Mr. Walczak said. "Spying on peaceful protesters should not be part of that process."

Similar Freedom of Information Act requests have been filed by the national ACLU and by affiliates in Georgia, Rhode Island, Maine and California.