We sometimes wonder how the National Security Agency (NSA) came to have such a wide-ranging surveillance operation around the world – which is evident from numerous classified documents released by former agent, Edward Snowden.
This NSA was not accomplished by agents based at its headquarters in the United States, but also by undercover agents working at foreign companies based in China, Germany and South Korea to infiltrate and compromise foreign networks and devices, according to documents obtained by The Intercept.
NSA monitors foreign networks and data centers
The latest document from Snowden's office refers to a program called "physical subversion," in which covert NSA agents infiltrate foreign networks to gain access to sensitive data and systems in the global communications industry and, potentially, even some American businesses.
The document details various activities in the field of computer network attacks – information contained in the NSA’s so-called “core secrets,” in a system codenamed “Sentry Eagle.” The document dates from 2004, although there is no reason to believe the NSA has changed its behavior since then.
Previous documents have largely focused on American companies that provided the agency with vast amounts of customer data, including phone and email records, and have also revealed that the NSA's effort to hack other systems or work with private companies to weaken their own encryption systems was intended, but the latest report makes it clear that the agency could have embedded workers in foreign, as well as domestic, "commercial entities." But it's unclear whether those "commercial entities" are American or foreign, or both.
