Leaked documents reveal more than 1,000 targets of U.S. and British surveillance in recent years, including the office of an Israeli prime minister, heads of international aid organizations, foreign energy companies and a European Union official involved in antitrust battles with American technology businesses.
While the names of some political and diplomatic leaders have previously emerged as targets, the newly disclosed intelligence documents provide a much fuller portrait of the spies’ sweeping interests in more than 60 countries.
Britain’s Government Communications Headquarters, working closely with the U.S. National Security Agency, monitored the communications of senior EU officials, foreign leaders including African heads of state and sometimes their family members, directors of United Nations and other relief programs, and officials overseeing oil and finance ministries, according to the documents. In addition to Israel, some targets involve close allies like France and Germany, where tensions have already increased over recent revelations about spying by the National Security Agency.
Details of the surveillance are described in documents from the National Security Agency and Britain’s eavesdropping agency dating from 2008 to 2011. The target lists appear in a set of Government Communications Headquarters reports that sometimes identify which agency requested the surveillance, but more often do not. The documents were leaked by the former NSA contractor Edward Snowden and shared by The New York Times, The Guardian and Der Spiegel.
The reports are spare, technical bulletins produced as the spies, typically working out of British intelligence sites, systematically tapped one international communications link after another, focusing especially on satellite transmissions. The value of each link is gauged, in part, by the number of surveillance targets found to be using it for emails, text messages or phone calls. More than 1,000 targets, which also include people suspected of being terrorists or militants, are in the reports.
Some condemned the surveillance Friday as unjustified and improper. A spokesman for the European Commission, Pia Ahrenkilde Hansen, said that the latest revelations of U.S. and British spying in Europe “are unacceptable and deserve our strongest condemnation.”
She continued, “This is not the type of behavior that we expect from strategic partners.”
Some of the surveillance relates to issues that are being scrutinized by President Barack Obama and a panel he appointed in Washington, which on Wednesday recommended stricter limits on the NSA, including restrictions on spying on foreign leaders, particularly allies.
The reports show that spies monitored the email traffic of several Israeli officials, including one target identified as “Israeli prime minister,” followed by an email address. The prime minister at the time of the interception, in January 2009, was Ehud Olmert. The next month, spies intercepted the email traffic of the Israeli defense minister, Ehud Barak, according to another report. Two Israeli embassies also appear on the target lists.
Olmert confirmed Friday that the email address was used for correspondence with his office, which he said staff members often handled. He added that it was unlikely that any secrets could have been compromised.
“This was an unimpressive target,” Olmert said. He noted, for example, that his most sensitive discussions with President George W. Bush took place in private.
“I would be surprised if there was any attempt by American intelligence in Israel to listen to the prime minister’s lines,” he said.
Barak, who declined to comment, has said publicly that he used to take it for granted that he was under surveillance.
Also appearing on the surveillance lists is Joaquin Almunia, vice president of the European Commission, which, among other powers, has oversight of antitrust issues in Europe. The commission has broad authority over local and foreign companies, and has punished a number of U.S. companies, including Microsoft and Intel, with heavy fines for hampering fair competition. The reports say that spies intercepted Almunia’s communications in 2008 and 2009.
Contacted by The New York Times, Almunia said he was “strongly upset” about the spying.
Hansen, the spokesman for the European Commission, said that it was already engaged in talks with the United States that were “needed to restore trust and confidence in the trans-Atlantic relationship.” She added that “the commission will raise these new allegations with U.S. and U.K. authorities.”
In a statement, the NSA denied that it had ever carried out espionage to benefit U.S. businesses.
“We do not use our foreign intelligence capabilities to steal the trade secrets of foreign companies on behalf of - or give intelligence we collect to - U.S. companies to enhance their international competitiveness or increase their bottom line,” said Vanee Vines, an NSA spokesman.
But she added that some economic spying was justified by national security needs.
“The intelligence community’s efforts to understand economic systems and policies, and monitor anomalous economic activities, are critical to providing policymakers with the information they need to make informed decisions that are in the best interest of our national security,” Vines said.
Spies have a freer hand with economic targets in Britain, where the law permits intelligence gathering in the service of the “economic well-being” of the country. A Government Communications Headquarters spokesman said that its policy was not to comment on intelligence matters, but that the agency “takes its obligations under the law very seriously.”
At the request of the Government Communications Headquarters, The Times agreed to withhold some details from the documents because of security concerns.
Germany is especially sensitive about U.S. spying since reports emerged that the agency listened to Chancellor Angela Merkel’s cellphone calls. Negotiations for a proposed agreement between Germany and the United States on spying rules have recently stalled for several reasons, including the refusal of the United States to guarantee that it would never spy on German officials as well as the prime minister.
Multiple U.N. missions in Geneva are listed as targets, including the United Nations Children’s Fund, or UNICEF, and the U.N. Institute for Disarmament Research. So is Medecins du Monde, a medical relief organization that goes into war-ravaged areas.Leigh Daynes, an executive director of the organization in Britain, responded to news about the surveillance by saying: “There is absolutely no reason for our operations to be secretly monitored.”
More obvious intelligence targets are also listed, though in smaller numbers, including people identified as “Israeli grey arms dealer,” “Taleban ministry of refugee affairs” and “various entities in Beijing.” Some of those included are described as possible members of al-Qaida and as suspected extremists or jihadists.
While few if any U.S. citizens appear to be named in the documents, they make clear that some of the intercepted communications either began or ended in the United States and that National Security Agency facilities carried out interceptions around the world in collaboration with their British partners. Some of the interceptions appear to have been made at the Sugar Grove, Va., listening post run by the NSA and code-named Timberline, and some are explicitly tied to agency target lists in the reports.
Obama suggested Friday that he may be ready to make some changes in the bulk collection of Americans’ phone records to allay the public’s concern about privacy.
Obama said he has not yet made any decisions about the National Security Agency’s collection programs. But among the dozens of recommendations he’s considering, he hinted that he may strip the agency of its ability to store data in its own facilities and instead shift that storage to the private phone companies.
“There may be another way of skinning the cat,” Obama said during a news conference.
His hint at concessions came the same week a federal judge declared the bulk collection program unconstitutional and a presidential advisory panel that included intelligence experts suggested changes. Both the judge and the panel said there was little evidence any terrorist plot had been thwarted by the program, known as Section 215 of the USAPATRIOT Act.
“There are ways we can do it, potentially, that gives people greater assurance that there are checks and balances - that there’s sufficient oversight and sufficient transparency,” Obama said. Programs like the bulk collection of phone records “could be redesigned in ways that give you the same information when you need it without creating these potentials for abuse.”
The federal judge who declared the National Security Agency’s vast phone data collection unconstitutional, Richard Leon, called the agency’s operation “Orwellian” in scale and said there was little evidence that its gargantuan inventory of phone records from American users had prevented a terrorist attack. However, he stopped his ruling Monday from taking effect, pending a likely government appeal.
Also Friday, AT&T Inc. said it will publish reports on the number of requests for customer information that it receives from law enforcement agencies, the latest move in the telecommunications industry toward fuller disclosure amid debate over government surveillance programs.
The announcement by the nation’s largest telecom company came a day after rival Verizon Communications Inc. said it will make public the legal demands it has received. Dallas-based AT&T says it will publish a report twice a year online. The first one, covering requests received this year, will be out early next year.
Major shareholders of AT&T and Verizon demanded last month that the companies disclose their dealings with the NSA.
To the extent allowed by law, AT&T said its “transparency” report will include the total number of requests it receives from law enforcement agencies in criminal cases; a breakdown of the number of subpoenas, court orders and warrants received; the number of customers affected; and details about the legal demands it receives.
Several major Internet companies, including Google, Microsoft, Apple, Facebook and Yahoo, publish periodic reports disclosing the number of requests from federal agencies and local police departments for personal data, which cover such things as email communications.
Until now, however, telecommunications companies haven’t filed such reports.
Information for this article was contributed by James Glanz, Andrew Lehren, Katrin Bennhold, David E. Sanger and Ethan Bronner of The New York Times and by Eileen Sullivan and Marcy Gordon of The Associated Press.
Front Section, Pages 1 on 12/21/2013