(Wikimedia Commons)

The Obama administration provided a detailed plan of National Security Agency surveillance rules Thursday that would transfer millions of telephone records from the government to private phone companies.

Obama's proposed plan will require approval from Congress before being implemented.

Democrats and Republicans have attempted to bring legislation targeted towards ending government storage of metadata, including incoming and outgoing phone numbers and call times.

Instead, phone companies would store the data for no more than 18 months, during which time the government could request specific records from the company. 

Read more about Obama's NSA announcement at USA TODAY.

Reach Executive Producer Jianyu Zhao here.