  Recently a symmetry-based method to test for statistical isotropy of the
cosmic microwave background was developed. We apply the method to
template-cleaned 3-year and 5-year WMAP-$DA$ maps. We examine a wide range of
angular multipoles from $2 < l < 300$. The analysis detects statistically
signicant signals of anisotropy inconsistent with an isotropic CMB in some of
the foreground cleaned maps. We are unable to resolve whether the anomalies
have a cosmological, local astrophysical or instrumental origin. Assuming the
anisotropy arises due to residual foreground contamination, we estimate the
residual foreground power in the maps. For the W band maps, we also find a
highly improbable degree of isotropy we cannot explain. We speculate that
excess isotropy may be caused by faulty modeling of detector noise.
