US president Barack Obama has announced plans to limit sweeping government surveillance programs that have come under criticism since leaks by a former spy agency contractor.

"Given the history of abuse by governments, it's right to ask questions about surveillance, particularly as technology is reshaping every aspect of our lives," Mr Obama told reporters at the White House.

Mr Obama said he was unveiling specific steps to improve oversight of surveillance and restore public trust in the government's programs.

"It's not enough for me as president to have confidence in these programs. The American people need to have confidence in them, as well," he said.

Senior administration officials said earlier that Mr Obama would call on Congress to work with him to rein in the National Security Agency's (NSA) collection of internet and phone data.

"All these steps are designed to ensure that the American people can trust that our efforts are this line with our interests and our values," Mr Obama said.

"And to others around the world I want to make clear once again that America is not interested in spying on ordinary people."

The announcement - made just before Mr Obama heads for summer vacation on Martha's Vineyard - may be greeted as at least a partial victory for supporters of ex-NSA contractor Edward Snowden, who is now in Russia after being granted asylum last week.

Despite the announcement, the Obama administration has vigorously pursued Snowden to bring him back to the United States to face espionage charges for leaking details of the surveillance programs to the media.

"I don't think Mr Snowden was a patriot," Mr Obama said at the news conference.

Under pressure to respond to the disclosures by Snowden, Mr Obama plans to overhaul Section 215 of the anti-terrorism Patriot Act that governs the collection of metadata such as phone records.

Mr Obama will also pursue with Congress a reform of the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which considers requests from law enforcement authorities to target an individual for intelligence gathering.

He wants to let a civil liberties representative weigh in on the court's deliberations to ensure an adversarial voice is heard, administration officials say.

Obama also says he wants to provide more details about the NSA programs to try to restore any public trust damaged by the Snowden disclosures.

The administration will also form a high-level group of outside experts to review the US surveillance effort.

Snowden disclosure raises concerns over Patriot Act

The Patriot Act, launched by then-president George W Bush after the September 11, 2001 attacks, was initiated as a terrorism-fighting tool to prevent a similar attack from ever happening again.

But frequent questions have been raised about the scope of the law and whether its sweeping tactics allows unwarranted intelligence gathering on innocent Americans.

The Snowden disclosures generated concerns about whether people were being forced to sacrifice their constitutionally guaranteed civil liberties in the open-ended search for terrorism links.

Mr Obama met with the CEOs of technology and telecoms companies such Apple and AT&T on Thursday to discuss government surveillance.

A Google computer scientist and transparency advocates also participated in the meeting, according to the White House.

The search for Snowden has upset US relations with some Latin American countries, China and, above all, Russia.

Mr Obama this week cancelled a planned summit in Moscow with president Vladimir Putin.

"Frankly, on a whole range of issues where we think we can make some progress, Russia has not moved," Mr Obama said.

Reuters