Author Topic: A Half-Century of Surveillance  (Read 139 times)

Kal EL

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A Half-Century of Surveillance
« on: December 19, 2005, 09:29:12 AM »
A Half-Century of Surveillance


New York Times | December 16 2005

HISTORY Created in 1952, the National Security Agency is the biggest American intelligence agency, with more than 30,000 employees at Fort Meade, Md., and listening posts around the world. Part of the Defense Department, it is the successor to the State Department's "Black Chamber" and American military eavesdropping and code-breaking operations that date to the early days of telegraph and telephone communications.

MISSION The N.S.A. runs the eavesdropping hardware of the American intelligence system, operating a huge network of satellites and listening devices around the world. Traditionally, its mission has been to gather intelligence overseas on foreign enemies by breaking codes and tapping into telephone and computer communications.

SUCCESSES Most of the agency's successes remain secret, but a few have been revealed. The agency listened to Soviet pilots and ground controllers during the shooting down of a civilian South Korean airliner in 1983; traced a disco bombing in Berlin in 1986 to Libya through diplomatic messages; and, more recently, used the identifying chips in cellphones to track terrorist suspects after the 2001 attacks.

DOMESTIC ACTIVITY The disclosure in the 1970's of widespread surveillance on political dissenters and other civil rights abuses led to restrictions at the N.S.A. and elsewhere on the use of domestic wiretaps. The N.S.A. monitors United Nations delegations and some foreign embassy lines on American soil, but is generally prohibited from listening in on the conversations of anyone inside the country without a special court order.

OFFICIAL RULES Since the reforms of the late 1970's, the N.S.A. has generally been permitted to target the communications of people on American soil only if they are believed to be "agents of a foreign power" — a foreign nation or international terrorist group — and a warrant is obtained from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.

EXPANDED ROLE Months after the terror attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, President Bush signed a secret executive order that relaxed restrictions on domestic spying by the N.S.A., according to officials with knowledge of the order. The order allows the agency to monitor without warrants the international phone calls and e-mail messages of some Americans and others inside the United States.