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87-632: The United States Senate Select Committee on Intelligence (sometimes referred to as the Intelligence Committee or SSCI ) is dedicated to overseeing the United States Intelligence Community —the agencies and bureaus of the federal government of the United States that provide information and analysis for leaders of the executive and legislative branches. The Committee was established in 1976 by

174-664: A report on the policies of the CIA on torture . In 2017, the SSCI began investigating Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections , possible incriminating links between members of the Russian government and members of Donald Trump 's presidential campaign team, and the security of election processes in the United States. On April 21, 2020, the SSCI (chaired at the time by the Republican Richard Burr ) released

261-571: A transparent process for replacing the outdated Data Encryption Standard (DES) by an Advanced Encryption Standard (AES). Cybersecurity policy expert Susan Landau attributes the NSA's harmonious collaboration with industry and academia in the selection of the AES in 2000—and the Agency's support for the choice of a strong encryption algorithm designed by Europeans rather than by Americans—to Brian Snow , who

348-546: A "wake-up call" for the need to invest in the agency's infrastructure. In the 1990s the defensive arm of the NSA—the Information Assurance Directorate (IAD)—started working more openly; the first public technical talk by an NSA scientist at a major cryptography conference was J. Solinas' presentation on efficient Elliptic Curve Cryptography algorithms at Crypto 1997. The IAD's cooperative approach to academia and industry culminated in its support for

435-714: A 2010 article in The Washington Post , "every day, collection systems at the National Security Agency intercept and store 1.7  billion e-mails, phone calls and other types of communications. The NSA sorts a fraction of those into 70 separate databases." Because of its listening task, NSA/CSS has been heavily involved in cryptanalytic research, continuing the work of predecessor agencies which had broken many World War II codes and ciphers (see, for instance, Purple , Venona project , and JN-25 ). In 2004, NSA Central Security Service and

522-603: A file xkeyscorerules100.txt, sourced by German TV stations NDR and WDR , who claim to have excerpts from its source code) reveal that the NSA tracks users of privacy-enhancing software tools, including Tor ; an anonymous email service provided by the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) in Cambridge, Massachusetts; and readers of the Linux Journal . Linus Torvalds ,

609-541: A major effort to secure tactical communications among U.S. forces during the war with mixed success. The NESTOR family of compatible secure voice systems it developed was widely deployed during the Vietnam War , with about 30,000 NESTOR sets produced. However, a variety of technical and operational problems limited their use, allowing the North Vietnamese to exploit and intercept U.S. communications. In

696-482: A matter of political controversy on several occasions, including its spying on anti–Vietnam War leaders and the agency's participation in economic espionage . In 2013, the NSA had many of its secret surveillance programs revealed to the public by Edward Snowden , a former NSA contractor. According to the leaked documents, the NSA intercepts and stores the communications of over a billion people worldwide, including United States citizens. The documents also revealed that

783-592: A memorial at the National Cryptologic Museum in Fort Meade, Maryland. The memorial is a, "tribute to the pioneers and heroes who have made significant and long-lasting contributions to American cryptology". NSA employees must be retired for more than fifteen years to qualify for the memorial. NSA's infrastructure deteriorated in the 1990s as defense budget cuts resulted in maintenance deferrals. On January 24, 2000, NSA headquarters suffered

870-476: A much redacted report with its final judgment that the intelligence community's assessment was "coherent and well-constructed"; the SSCI therefore supports the intelligence community's claim that Putin's "interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election" in favor of candidate Trump was unprecedented in its "manner and aggressiveness". Nevertheless, no direct evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia

957-477: A result of the boomerang routing of Canadian Internet service providers . A document included in NSA files released with Glenn Greenwald 's book No Place to Hide details how the agency's Tailored Access Operations (TAO) and other NSA units gain access to hardware. They intercept routers , servers , and other network hardware being shipped to organizations targeted for surveillance and install covert implant firmware onto them before they are delivered. This

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1044-457: A secret filing system that was destroyed in 1974. Following the resignation of President Richard Nixon , there were several investigations into suspected misuse of FBI, CIA and NSA facilities. Senator Frank Church uncovered previously unknown activity, such as a CIA plot (ordered by the administration of President John F. Kennedy ) to assassinate Fidel Castro . The investigation also uncovered NSA's wiretaps on targeted U.S. citizens. After

1131-403: A total network outage for three days caused by an overloaded network. Incoming traffic was successfully stored on agency servers, but it could not be directed and processed. The agency carried out emergency repairs for $ 3  million to get the system running again. (Some incoming traffic was also directed instead to Britain's GCHQ for the time being.) Director Michael Hayden called the outage

1218-587: Is a broad term that may entail for example: Collection, analysis, and production of sensitive information to support national security leaders, including policymakers, military commanders, and members of Congress. Safeguarding these processes and this information through counterintelligence activities. Execution of covert operations approved by the president. The IC strives to provide valuable insight on important issues by gathering raw intelligence, analyzing that data in context, and producing timely and relevant products for customers at all levels of national security—from

1305-581: Is also alleged to have been behind such attack software as Stuxnet , which severely damaged Iran's nuclear program . The NSA, alongside the CIA, maintains a physical presence in many countries across the globe; the CIA/NSA joint Special Collection Service (a highly classified intelligence team) inserts eavesdropping devices in high-value targets (such as presidential palaces or embassies). SCS collection tactics allegedly encompass "close surveillance, burglary, wiretapping, [and] breaking and entering". Unlike

1392-937: Is believed by Glenn Greenwald of The Guardian to be the model for the comprehensive worldwide mass archiving of communications which NSA is engaged in as of 2013. A dedicated unit of the NSA locates targets for the CIA for extrajudicial assassination in the Middle East. The NSA has also spied extensively on the European Union, the United Nations, and numerous governments including allies and trading partners in Europe, South America, and Asia. In June 2015, WikiLeaks published documents showing that NSA spied on French companies. WikiLeaks also published documents showing that NSA spied on federal German ministries since

1479-702: Is counted as one of its 17 constituent agencies. The other members of the IC are: The IC performs under two separate programs: Since the definitions of the NIP and MIP overlap when they address military intelligence , the assignment of intelligence activities to the NIP and MIP sometimes proves problematic. The overall organization of the IC is primarily governed by the National Security Act of 1947 (as amended) and Executive Order 12333 . The statutory organizational relationships were substantially revised with

1566-526: The COVID-19 pandemic . Senator McConnell announced on May 18, 2020 that Marco Rubio would replace Burr temporarily. Source: Member list Source: Member List Acting United States Intelligence Community The United States Intelligence Community ( IC ) is a group of separate U.S. federal government intelligence agencies and subordinate organizations that work both separately and collectively to conduct intelligence activities which support

1653-698: The Department of State , the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). In December 1951, President Harry S. Truman ordered a panel to investigate how AFSA had failed to achieve its goals. The results of the investigation led to improvements and its redesignation as the National Security Agency. The National Security Council issued a memorandum of October 24, 1952, that revised National Security Council Intelligence Directive (NSCID) 9 . On

1740-591: The Federation of American Scientists , which provides analyses of national security issues, stated that "It was a titanic struggle just to get the top-line budget number disclosed, and that has only been done consistently since 2007 ... but a real grasp of the structure and operations of the intelligence bureaucracy has been totally beyond public reach. This kind of material, even on a historical basis, has simply not been available." Access to budget details will enable an informed public debate on intelligence spending for

1827-715: The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court when within U.S. borders. Alleged Echelon-related activities, including its use for motives other than national security, including political and industrial espionage , received criticism from countries outside the UKUSA alliance. The NSA was also involved in planning to blackmail people with " SEXINT ", intelligence gained about a potential target's sexual activity and preferences. Those targeted had not committed any apparent crime nor were they charged with one. To support its facial recognition program,

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1914-872: The Joint Intelligence Community Council , the Office of the Inspector General , and the Office of Management and Budget . Primary congressional oversight jurisdiction over the IC is assigned to two committees : the United States House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and the United States Senate Select Committee on Intelligence . The House Armed Services Committee and Senate Armed Services Committee draft bills to annually authorize

2001-753: The National Cyber Security Division of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agreed to expand the NSA Centers of Academic Excellence in Information Assurance Education Program. As part of the National Security Presidential Directive 54/Homeland Security Presidential Directive 23 (NSPD 54), signed on January 8, 2008, by President Bush, the NSA became the lead agency to monitor and protect all of

2088-643: The U.S. Army cryptographic section of military intelligence known as MI-8, the U.S. government created the Cipher Bureau, also known as Black Chamber , in 1919. The Black Chamber was the United States' first peacetime cryptanalytic organization. Jointly funded by the Army and the State Department, the Cipher Bureau was disguised as a New York City commercial code company; it produced and sold such codes for business use. Its true mission, however,

2175-639: The US Court of Appeals . The court also added that the US intelligence leaders, who publicly defended it, were not telling the truth. NSA's eavesdropping mission includes radio broadcasting, both from various organizations and individuals, the Internet, telephone calls, and other intercepted forms of communication. Its secure communications mission includes military, diplomatic, and all other sensitive, confidential, or secret government communications. According to

2262-483: The foreign policy and national security interests of the United States. Member organizations of the IC include intelligence agencies , military intelligence , and civilian intelligence and analysis offices within federal executive departments . The IC is overseen by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), which is headed by the director of national intelligence (DNI) who reports directly to

2349-625: The president of the United States . The IC was established by Executive Order 12333 ("United States Intelligence Activities"), signed on December 4, 1981, by President Ronald Reagan . The statutory definition of the IC, including its roster of agencies, was codified as the Intelligence Organization Act of 1992 ( Pub. L.   102–496 , H.R. 5095 , 106  Stat.   3188 ). The Washington Post reported in 2010 that there were 1,271 government organizations and 1,931 private companies in 10,000 locations in

2436-606: The procurement of technology and services (including analysis), according to the May 2007 chart from the ODNI. Intelligence spending has increased by a third over ten years ago, in inflation -adjusted dollars, according to the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments . In a statement on the release of new declassified figures, DNI Mike McConnell said there would be no additional disclosures of classified budget information beyond

2523-486: The 1990s. Even Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel 's cellphones and phones of her predecessors had been intercepted. Edward Snowden revealed in June 2013 that between February 8 and March 8, 2013, the NSA collected about 124.8  billion telephone data items and 97.1  billion computer data items throughout the world, as was displayed in charts from an internal NSA tool codenamed Boundless Informant . Initially, it

2610-401: The 2004 Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act (IRTPA) amendments to the 1947 National Security Act. Though the IC characterizes itself as a federation of its member elements, its overall structure is better characterized as a confederation due to its lack of a well-defined, unified leadership and governance structure. Prior to 2004, the director of Central Intelligence (DCI)

2697-667: The 2005 National Intelligence Strategy . The United States intelligence budget (excluding the Military Intelligence Program) in fiscal year 2022 was appropriated as $ 65.7 billion, an increase of $ 3.4 billion from the $ 62.3 billion requested and up from $ 60.8 billion in fiscal year 2021. The total budget of the National Intelligence Program has been public since 2007, due to the Implementing Recommendations of

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2784-569: The 9/11 Commission Act of 2007 , which required them to disclose the "aggregate amount of funds appropriated by Congress” for the NIP within 30 days of the end of the fiscal year. The requested budget of the NIP has been public since 2011 due to a requirement enacted by Congress in Section 364 of the Intelligence Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2010. About 70 percent of the intelligence budget went to contractors for

2871-425: The 94th Congress. The Committee is "select" in that membership is temporary and rotated among members of the chamber. The committee comprises 15 members. Eight of those seats are reserved for one majority and one minority member of each of the following committees: Appropriations , Armed Services , Foreign Relations , and Judiciary . Of the remaining seven, four are members of the majority, and three are members of

2958-604: The Black Chamber access to cable traffic of foreign embassies and consulates. Soon, these companies publicly discontinued their collaboration. Despite the Chamber's initial successes, it was shut down in 1929 by U.S. Secretary of State Henry L. Stimson , who defended his decision by stating, "Gentlemen do not read each other's mail." During World War II , the Signal Intelligence Service (SIS)

3045-495: The CIA and the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), both of which specialize primarily in foreign human espionage , the NSA does not publicly conduct human intelligence gathering . The NSA is entrusted with assisting with and coordinating, SIGINT elements for other government organizations—which are prevented by Executive Order from engaging in such activities on their own. As part of these responsibilities,

3132-689: The Church Committee hearings, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 was passed. This was designed to limit the practice of mass surveillance in the United States . In 1986, the NSA intercepted the communications of the Libyan government during the immediate aftermath of the Berlin discotheque bombing . The White House asserted that the NSA interception had provided "irrefutable" evidence that Libya

3219-663: The IC include technological, structural, procedural, and cultural dimensions. Examples include the Intellipedia wiki of encyclopedic security-related information; the creation of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence , National Intelligence Centers , Program Manager Information Sharing Environment , and Information Sharing Council ; legal and policy frameworks set by the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 , information sharing Executive Order 13354 and Executive Order 13388 , and

3306-630: The IC primarily through statutory authorities under which he or she: Despite these responsibilities, the DNI has no authority to direct and control any element of the IC except his own staff—the Office of the DNI—nor does the DNI have the authority to hire or fire personnel in the IC except those on his or her own staff. The member elements in the executive branch are directed and controlled by their respective department heads, all cabinet-level officials reporting to

3393-676: The Intelligence Capabilities of the United States Regarding Weapons of Mass Destruction), the authorities and powers of the DNI and the overall organizational structure of the IC have become subject of intense debate in the United States. Previously, interagency cooperation and the flow of information among the member agencies was hindered by policies that sought to limit the pooling of information out of privacy and security concerns. Attempts to modernize and facilitate interagency cooperation within

3480-631: The Intelligence Committee would be heavily represented, would increase the Committee's influence and leverage over executive branch intelligence agencies, and require continuing disclosure of the annual budget for the National Intelligence Program. The proposal has been opposed by the leadership of the Senate Appropriations Committee , however. In 2013, and beyond, the SSCI received renewed attention in

3567-590: The NSA is intercepting "millions of images per day". The Real Time Regional Gateway is a data collection program introduced in 2005 in Iraq by the NSA during the Iraq War that consisted of gathering all electronic communication, storing it, then searching and otherwise analyzing it. It was effective in providing information about Iraqi insurgents who had eluded less comprehensive techniques. This "collect it all" strategy introduced by NSA director, Keith B. Alexander ,

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3654-447: The NSA that allowed the export of a version that supported stronger keys with 64 bits, but 24 of the bits were encrypted with a special key and included in the message to provide a "workload reduction factor" for the NSA. This strengthened the protection for users of Notes outside the US against private-sector industrial espionage , but not against spying by the US government. While it is assumed that foreign transmissions terminating in

3741-498: The NSA tracks hundreds of millions of people's movements using cell phones metadata . Internationally, research has pointed to the NSA's ability to surveil the domestic Internet traffic of foreign countries through " boomerang routing ". The origins of the National Security Agency can be traced back to April 28, 1917, three weeks after the U.S. Congress declared war on Germany in World War I . A code and cipher decryption unit

3828-498: The NSA was a trusted partner with academia and industry in the development of cryptographic standards started to come to an end when, as part of the change in the NSA in the post-September 11 era, Snow was replaced as Technical Director, Jacobs retired, and IAD could no longer effectively oppose proposed actions by the offensive arm of the NSA. In the aftermath of the September 11 attacks , the NSA created new IT systems to deal with

3915-531: The NSA was not known to the public at that time. Due to its ultra-secrecy, the U.S. intelligence community referred to the NSA as "No Such Agency". In the 1960s, the NSA played a key role in expanding U.S. commitment to the Vietnam War by providing evidence of a North Vietnamese attack on the American destroyer USS  Maddox during the Gulf of Tonkin incident . A secret operation, code-named " MINARET ",

4002-567: The NSA's Tailored Access Operations (TAO) group implant catalog, after implanting Cottonmouth, the NSA can establish a network bridge "that allows the NSA to load exploit software onto modified computers as well as allowing the NSA to relay commands and data between hardware and software implants." NSA's mission, as outlined in Executive Order 12333 in 1981, is to collect information that constitutes "foreign intelligence or counterintelligence" while not "acquiring information concerning

4089-553: The Treasury , and Department of Energy . The Committee makes recommendations to the Senate Armed Services Committee on authorizations for the intelligence-related components of the U.S. Army , U.S. Navy , U.S. Air Force , and U.S. Marine Corps . The Committee also conducts periodic investigations, audits, and inspections of intelligence activities and programs. The Select Committee on Intelligence

4176-597: The U.S. (such as a non-U.S. citizen accessing a U.S. website) subject non-U.S. citizens to NSA surveillance, recent research into boomerang routing has raised new concerns about the NSA's ability to surveil the domestic Internet traffic of foreign countries. Boomerang routing occurs when an Internet transmission that originates and terminates in a single country transits another. Research at the University of Toronto has suggested that approximately 25% of Canadian domestic traffic may be subject to NSA surveillance activities as

4263-598: The United States National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), and the International Organization for Standardization (aka ISO). This memo appears to give credence to previous speculation by cryptographers at Microsoft Research . Edward Snowden claims that the NSA often bypasses encryption altogether by lifting information before it is encrypted or after it is decrypted. XKeyscore rules (as specified in

4350-505: The United States that were working on counterterrorism , homeland security , and intelligence, and that the intelligence community as a whole would include 854,000 people holding top-secret clearances . The term Intelligence Community was first used during LTG Walter Bedell Smith 's tenure as Director of Central Intelligence (1950–1953). Intelligence is information that agencies collect, analyze, and distribute in response to government leaders' questions and requirements. Intelligence

4437-511: The ability to monitor a large proportion of the world's transmitted civilian telephone, fax, and data traffic. During the early 1970s, the first of what became more than eight large satellite communications dishes were installed at Menwith Hill. Investigative journalist Duncan Campbell reported in 1988 on the " ECHELON " surveillance program, an extension of the UKUSA Agreement on global signals intelligence SIGINT , and detailed how

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4524-526: The aftermath of the Watergate scandal , a congressional hearing in 1975 led by Senator Frank Church revealed that the NSA, in collaboration with Britain's SIGINT intelligence agency, Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), had routinely intercepted the international communications of prominent anti-Vietnam war leaders such as Jane Fonda and Dr. Benjamin Spock . The NSA tracked these individuals in

4611-803: The agency has a co-located organization called the Central Security Service (CSS), which facilitates cooperation between the NSA and other U.S. defense cryptanalysis components. To further ensure streamlined communication between the signals intelligence community divisions, the NSA Director simultaneously serves as the Commander of the United States Cyber Command and as Chief of the Central Security Service. The NSA's actions have been

4698-449: The budgets of DoD intelligence activities, and both the House and Senate appropriations committees annually draft bills to appropriate the budgets of the IC. The Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs took a leading role in formulating the intelligence reform legislation in the 108th Congress . Notes Further reading NSA Originating as a unit to decipher coded communications in World War II , it

4785-416: The eavesdropping operations worked. On November 3, 1999, the BBC reported that they had confirmation from the Australian Government of the existence of a powerful "global spying network" code-named Echelon, that could "eavesdrop on every single phone call, fax or e-mail, anywhere on the planet" with Britain and the United States as the chief protagonists. They confirmed that Menwith Hill was "linked directly to

4872-412: The equivalent agencies in the United Kingdom ( Government Communications Headquarters ), Canada ( Communications Security Establishment ), Australia ( Australian Signals Directorate ), and New Zealand ( Government Communications Security Bureau ), otherwise known as the UKUSA group, was reported to be in command of the operation of the so-called ECHELON system. Its capabilities were suspected to include

4959-410: The federal government's computer networks from cyber-terrorism . A part of the NSA's mission is to serve as a combat support agency for the Department of Defense. Operations by the National Security Agency can be divided into three types: "Echelon" was created in the incubator of the Cold War . Today it is a legacy system , and several NSA stations are closing. NSA/CSS, in combination with

5046-444: The first time, said the co-chair of the 9/11 Commission Lee H. Hamilton. He added that Americans should not be excluded from the budget process because the intelligence community has a profound impact on the life of ordinary Americans. Intelligence Community Oversight duties are distributed to both the executive and legislative branches. Primary executive oversight is performed by the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board ,

5133-504: The flood of information from new technologies like the Internet and cell phones. ThinThread contained advanced data mining capabilities. It also had a "privacy mechanism"; surveillance was stored encrypted; decryption required a warrant. The research done under this program may have contributed to the technology used in later systems. ThinThread was canceled when Michael Hayden chose Trailblazer , which did not include ThinThread's privacy system. Trailblazer Project ramped up in 2002 and

5220-410: The founder of Linux kernel , joked during a LinuxCon keynote on September 18, 2013, that the NSA, who is the founder of SELinux , wanted a backdoor in the kernel. However, later, Linus' father, a Member of the European Parliament (MEP), revealed that the NSA actually did this. When my oldest son was asked the same question: "Has he been approached by the NSA about backdoors?" he said "No", but at

5307-414: The headquarters of the US National Security Agency (NSA) at Fort Meade in Maryland". NSA's United States Signals Intelligence Directive 18 (USSID 18) strictly prohibited the interception or collection of information about "... U.S. persons , entities, corporations or organizations...." without explicit written legal permission from the United States Attorney General when the subject is located abroad, or

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5394-466: The minority. In addition, the Majority Leader and Minority Leader are non-voting ex officio members of the committee. Also, the Chairman and Ranking Member of the Committee on Armed Services (if not already a member of the select Committee) are ex officio members. As part of its oversight responsibilities, the Committee performs an annual review of the intelligence budget submitted by the president and prepares legislation authorizing appropriations for

5481-436: The overall spending figure because "such disclosures could harm national security". How the money is divided among the 16 intelligence agencies and what it is spent on is classified. It includes salaries for about 100,000 people, multi billion-dollar satellite programs , aircraft , weapons , electronic sensors, intelligence analysis , spies , computers , and software . On August 29, 2013 The Washington Post published

5568-411: The president. By law, only the director of the Central Intelligence Agency reports to the DNI. In light of major intelligence failures in recent years that called into question how well Intelligence Community ensures U.S. national security, particularly those identified by the 9/11 Commission (National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States), and the " WMD Commission " (Commission on

5655-439: The prewar public statements made by top Bush administration officials to justify the invasion with the intelligence information that was available to them at that time. In a March 6, 2008, letter to the Senate leadership, 14 of the 15 then members of the Committee proposed the creation of a new Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Intelligence to prepare the annual intelligence budget. The proposed Subcommittee, on which members of

5742-406: The same day, Truman issued a second memorandum that called for the establishment of the NSA. The actual establishment of the NSA was done by a November 4 memo by Robert A. Lovett , the Secretary of Defense , changing the name of the AFSA to the NSA, and making the new agency responsible for all communications intelligence. Since President Truman's memo was a classified document, the existence of

5829-556: The same time he nodded. Then he was sort of in the legal free. He had given the right answer, everybody understood that the NSA had approached him. IBM Notes was the first widely adopted software product to use public key cryptography for client-server and server–server authentication and encryption of data. Until US laws regulating encryption were changed in 2000, IBM and Lotus were prohibited from exporting versions of Notes that supported symmetric encryption keys that were longer than 40 bits. In 1997, Lotus negotiated an agreement with

5916-438: The summary of the Office of the Director of National Intelligence's multivolume FY 2013 Congressional Budget Justification, the U.S. Intelligence Community's top-secret "black budget". The IC's FY 2013 budget details how the 16 spy agencies use the money and how it performs against the goals set by the president and Congress. Experts said that access to such details about U.S. spy programs is without precedent. Steven Aftergood of

6003-404: The unit consisted of Yardley and two civilian clerks. It absorbed the Navy's cryptanalysis functions in July 1918. World War I ended on November 11, 1918 , and the army cryptographic section of Military Intelligence (MI-8) moved to New York City on May 20, 1919, where it continued intelligence activities as the Code Compilation Company under the direction of Yardley. After the disbandment of

6090-465: The various civilian and military agencies and departments comprising the intelligence community. These entities include the Office of the Director of National Intelligence , Central Intelligence Agency , Defense Intelligence Agency , National Security Agency , National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency , National Reconnaissance Office , as well as the intelligence-related components of Department of State , Federal Bureau of Investigation , Department of

6177-548: The wake of Edward Snowden 's disclosures regarding the NSA surveillance of communications. Senator Dianne Feinstein and the SSCI made several statements on the matter, one of which was notably disputed: that the NSA tracked US citizens' locations via cellphone. Later, the SSCI Staff Director, David Grannis, claimed that the NSA did not collect cellphone location, claiming the Senator was "speaking extemporaneously". The SSCI later came to prominence in relation to voting to publish in March 2014 and then publishing in December 2014 of

6264-550: The war-fighter on the ground to the president in Washington. Executive Order 12333 charged the IC with six primary objectives: Before the CIA's establishment, several military intelligence agencies, and the FBI to a limited extent, fulfilled its role. The IC is headed by the director of national intelligence (DNI), whose statutory leadership is exercised through the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), and

6351-532: Was behind the bombing, which U.S. President Ronald Reagan cited as a justification for the 1986 United States bombing of Libya . In 1999, a multi-year investigation by the European Parliament highlighted the NSA's role in economic espionage in a report entitled 'Development of Surveillance Technology and Risk of Abuse of Economic Information'. That year, the NSA founded the NSA Hall of Honor ,

6438-655: Was created to intercept and decipher the communications of the Axis powers . When the war ended, the SIS was reorganized as the Army Security Agency (ASA), and it was placed under the leadership of the Director of Military Intelligence. On May 20, 1949, all cryptologic activities were centralized under a national organization called the Armed Forces Security Agency (AFSA). This organization

6525-521: Was described by an NSA manager as "some of the most productive operations in TAO because they preposition access points into hard target networks around the world." Computers seized by the NSA due to interdiction are often modified with a physical device known as Cottonmouth. Cottonmouth is a device that can be inserted in the USB port of a computer to establish remote access to the targeted machine. According to

6612-458: Was established as the Cable and Telegraph Section, which was also known as the Cipher Bureau. It was headquartered in Washington, D.C., and was part of the war effort under the executive branch without direct congressional authorization. During the war, it was relocated in the army's organizational chart several times. On July 5, 1917, Herbert O. Yardley was assigned to head the unit. At that point,

6699-516: Was found. In 2018, the SSCI Director of Security James Wolfe was arrested and convicted of lying to the FBI on the leak of classified documents to a reporter with whom he was in an affair. On May 14, 2020, Senator Burr, who oversaw the probe on Russian interference in the 2016 election, stepped down as SSCI chair due to an ongoing investigation regarding insider trading by Senator Burr during

6786-576: Was officially formed as the NSA by President Harry S. Truman in 1952. Between then and the end of the Cold War, it became the largest of the U.S. intelligence organizations in terms of personnel and budget, but information available as of 2013 indicates that the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) pulled ahead in this regard, with a budget of $ 14.7 billion. The NSA currently conducts worldwide mass data collection and has been known to physically bug electronic systems as one method to this end. The NSA

6873-612: Was originally established within the U.S. Department of Defense under the command of the Joint Chiefs of Staff . The AFSA was tasked with directing the Department of Defense communications and electronic intelligence activities, except those of U.S. military intelligence units. However, the AFSA was unable to centralize communications intelligence and failed to coordinate with civilian agencies that shared its interests, such as

6960-655: Was preceded by the Church Committee (1975). Senator Daniel K. Inouye (D-Hawaii) became the first chairman of the committee when it was established and remained in the role until 1979. On July 8, 2004, the committee issued the Report of the Select Committee on Intelligence on the U.S. Intelligence Community's Prewar Intelligence Assessments on Iraq , and on June 5, 2008, it issued a long-delayed portion of its "phase two" investigative report, which compared

7047-526: Was reported that some of these data reflected eavesdropping on citizens in countries like Germany, Spain, and France, but later on, it became clear that those data were collected by European agencies during military missions abroad and were subsequently shared with NSA. In 2013, reporters uncovered a secret memo that claims the NSA created and pushed for the adoption of the Dual EC DRBG encryption standard that contained built-in vulnerabilities in 2006 to

7134-523: Was set up by the NSA to monitor the phone communications of Senators Frank Church and Howard Baker , as well as key leaders of the civil rights movement , including Martin Luther King Jr. , and prominent U.S. journalists and athletes who criticized the Vietnam War . However, the project turned out to be controversial, and an internal review by the NSA concluded that its Minaret program was "disreputable if not outright illegal". The NSA mounted

7221-547: Was the Technical Director of IAD and represented the NSA as cochairman of the Technical Working Group for the AES competition, and Michael Jacobs , who headed IAD at the time. After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 , the NSA believed that it had public support for a dramatic expansion of its surveillance activities. According to Neal Koblitz and Alfred Menezes , the period when

7308-463: Was the head of the IC, in addition to being the director of the CIA. A major criticism of this arrangement was that the DCI had little or no actual authority over the budgetary authorities of the other IC agencies and therefore had limited influence over their operations. Following the passage of IRTPA in 2004, the head of the IC is the director of national intelligence (DNI). The DNI exerts leadership of

7395-417: Was to be a realization of information processing at higher speeds in cyberspace. The massive extent of the NSA's spying, both foreign and domestic, was revealed to the public in a series of detailed disclosures of internal NSA documents beginning in June 2013. Most of the disclosures were leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden . On 4 September 2020, the NSA's surveillance program was ruled unlawful by

7482-559: Was to break the communications (chiefly diplomatic) of other nations. At the Washington Naval Conference , it aided American negotiators by providing them with the decrypted traffic of many of the conference delegations, including the Japanese . The Black Chamber successfully persuaded Western Union , the largest U.S. telegram company at the time, as well as several other communications companies, to illegally give

7569-697: Was worked on by Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), Boeing , Computer Sciences Corporation , IBM , and Litton Industries . Some NSA whistleblowers complained internally about major problems surrounding Trailblazer. This led to investigations by Congress and the NSA and DoD Inspectors General . The project was canceled in early 2004. Turbulence started in 2005. It was developed in small, inexpensive "test" pieces, rather than one grand plan like Trailblazer. It also included offensive cyber-warfare capabilities, like injecting malware into remote computers. Congress criticized Turbulence in 2007 for having similar bureaucratic problems as Trailblazer. It

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