The NSA once published a spy newsletter bragging about the success of tapping foreign satellites
The Intercept announced Monday that it would publish the entire archive of the National Security Agency's Top Secret internal newsletter — documents that had exchanged hands back when Edward Snowden supplied them to The Intercept in his massive NSA leak in 2013.
The newsletter, SIDtoday, includes everything from information about the intercepted phone calls of a Russian mobster to a "SID around the World" column that published recommendations of things to do and eat by NSA employees stationed across the globe.
One newsletter boasted about the previously disclosed FORNSAT program, where for more than 30 years the NSA tapped into foreign satellite communications. However, according to The Intercept, the program was "an intelligence gold mine" with the newsletter bragging that it "consistently provided … over 25 percent of end product reporting."
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The program picked up "intelligence derived from diplomatic communications … airline reservations and billing data … traffic about terrorists, international crime, weapons of mass destruction … international finance and trade." At the time of the newsletter's publication in 2003, the technology was in need of an upgrade so the eavesdroppers could listen in on conversations not necessarily held just by voice. FORNSAT was looking to expand to spying on digital video as well as mobile satellite phone systems.
Read more about the program — as well as a list of the most intriguing spy stories in the newsletters — over at The Intercept.
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Jeva Lange was the executive editor at TheWeek.com. She formerly served as The Week's deputy editor and culture critic. She is also a contributor to Screen Slate, and her writing has appeared in The New York Daily News, The Awl, Vice, and Gothamist, among other publications. Jeva lives in New York City. Follow her on Twitter.
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