The National Security Agency has repeatedly violated privacy rules and overstepped its authority, an internal audit has revealed, despite vows from President Barack Obama to prevent abuses and protect Americans' civil rights.

The revelations cast fresh doubts on the Obama administration's reassurances that the NSA's electronic surveillance programs are tightly regulated and accountable to judicial review.

Hundreds of Muslims demonstrated in Indonesia and Malaysia Friday against a crackdown on the protest camps of Egypt's Islamists which left almost 600 people dead.

It came as Cairo braced for more protests after supporters of Mohammed Morsi, ousted as president in a military coup last month, called for a "Friday of anger", and the U.N. urged "maximum restraint" from all sides.

Egypt's president on Friday suggested U.S. President Barack Obama's condemnation of a deadly crackdown on Islamists may "encourage violent armed groups".

"The presidency fears statements not based on facts may encourage violent armed groups," it said in a statement responding to Obama's condemnation of Wednesday's carnage when police moved to disperse Islamist protest camps.

U.S. President Barack Obama said Thursday the United States has canceled military exercises with Egypt to protest the killing of hundreds of protesters, in his first public statement on the rapid developments in Egypt.

He interrupted his weeklong vacation to address the clashes that have left more than 500 people dead.

A former aide to Barack Obama has said the U.S. president resorted to playing cards on the day Osama bin Laden was killed, such was the tension over the raid.

Reggie Love, a personal assistant to Obama during the president's first term, said in a video that his boss opted not to watch the full live feed of the clandestine U.S. commando mission in Pakistan that killed the al-Qaida chief in 2011.

U.S. President Barack Obama started his summer vacation Saturday on ritzy Martha's Vineyard off the U.S. East Coast.

Dressed down, Obama and his wife Michelle landed on the elite island by helicopter for their eight-day getaway from Washington.

U.S. President Barack Obama said Friday that Russia has adopted a more anti-American attitude reminiscent of the Cold War since Vladimir Putin returned to office as president.

Obama said relations had thawed somewhat while Dmitry Medvedev was Russian president, but that when Putin returned to the Kremlin he "saw more rhetoric on the Russian side that was anti-American, that played into some of the old stereotypes about the Cold War contest between the United States and Russia."

U.S. President Barack Obama on Friday pledged an overhaul of government surveillance, acknowledging rising concerns over citizens' privacy.

Obama said he would ask Congress to review a controversial section of the Patriot Act that allows collection of telephone records and would provide for greater outside oversight.

President Barack Obama met at the White House with leaders of IT and telecoms giants, including Apple, Google and AT&T, to discuss controversial electronic surveillance programs, Politico reported Friday.

The White House confirmed the meeting, which was not mentioned on the president's agenda for Thursday, but it did not identify the participants.

Russian President Vladimir Putin will hold his first meeting with new Iranian President Hassan Rowhani on the sidelines of a regional summit in Kyrgyzstan next month, the Kremlin said Friday.

Russia has agreed to a proposal from Tehran for the meeting on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit on September 13 in Bishkek, Putin's top foreign policy aide Yury Ushakov said, quoted by Russian news agencies.