Project "Echelon" Exposed

project echelon is joint U.S-anglo listening system that enables
the government to spy on just about all communication systems.
Since it it is based in the U.K.it can used to spy on americans
without obtaining a warrant. The complete info is at wikipedia.
N.C.

ECHELON
> > From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
> >
> > ECHELON is a highly secretive world-wide signals intelligence and
> > analysis network run by the UKUSA Community (otherwise described
as
> > the "Anglo-Saxon alliance") [1]. ECHELON can capture radio and
> > satellite communications, telephone calls, faxes, e-mails and
other
> > data streams nearly anywhere in the world and includes computer
> > automated analysis and sorting of intercepts .
> >
> > History
> >
> > Reportedly created to monitor the military and diplomatic
> > communications of the Soviet Union and its East Bloc allies
during the
> > Cold War in the early sixties, ECHELON is today believed to also
> > search for hints of terrorist plots, drug-dealers' plans, and
> > political and diplomatic intelligence. But some critics claim the
> > system is also being used for large-scale commercial theft and
> > invasion of privacy.
> >
> > In May 2001, the European Parliament produced a report on ECHELON
[3]
> > which, among other things, recommended that citizens of member
states
> > routinely use cryptography in their communications to protect
their
> > privacy. In the UK, the government introduced the Regulation of
> > Investigatory Powers Act which gives authorities the power to
demand
> > that citizens hand over their encryption keys, without a
> > judge-approved warrant. In April 2004, the European Union decided
to
> > spend 11 million EUR developing secure communication based on
quantum
> > cryptography � the SECOQC project � a system that would
theoretically
> > be unbreakable by ECHELON or any other espionage system.
> >
> > ECHELON monitoring of mobile phones in Pakistan was reportedly
used to
> > track Khalid Shaikh Mohammed before he was arrested in Rawalpindi
on
> > March 1, 2003[citation needed].
> >
> > US intelligence agencies are generally prohibited from spying on
> > people inside the US, and other Western countries' intelligence
> > services generally faced similar restrictions within their own
> > countries. There are allegations, however, that ECHELON and the
UKUSA
> > alliance were used to circumvent these restrictions by, for
example,
> > having the UK facilities spy on people inside the US and the US
> > facilities spy on people in the UK, with the agencies exchanging
data
> > (perhaps even automatically through the ECHELON system without
human
> > intervention). The proposed US-only "Total Information Awareness"
> > program relied on technology similar to ECHELON, and was to
integrate
> > the extensive sources it is legally permitted to survey
domestically,
> > with the "taps" already compiled by ECHELON. It was cancelled by
the
> > U.S. Congress in 2004.
> >
> > It has been alleged that in 2002 the Bush Administration extended
the
> > ECHELON program to domestic surveillance. This controversy was the
> > subject of the New York Times eavesdropping expos� of December,
2005
> > [4] [5] [6] [7].
> > [edit]
> >
> > Organization
> >
> > The members of the English-speaking alliance are part of the UKUSA
> > intelligence alliance that has maintained ties in collecting and
> > sharing intelligence since World War II. Various sources claim
that
> > these states have positioned electronic-intercept stations and
space
> > satellites to capture most radio, satellite, microwave, cellular
and
> > fiber-optic communications traffic[citation needed]. The captured
> > signals are then processed through a series of supercomputers,
known
> > as dictionaries, that are programmed to search each communication
for
> > targeted addresses, words, phrases or even individual voices
[citation
> > needed].
> >
> > Each member of the UKUSA alliance is assigned responsibilities for
> > monitoring different parts of the globe. Canada's main task used
to be
> > monitoring northern portions of the former Soviet Union and
conducting
> > sweeps of all communications traffic that could be picked up from
> > embassies around the world. In the post-Cold War era, a greater
> > emphasis has been placed on monitoring satellite, radio and
cellphone
> > traffic originating from Central and South America, primarily in
an
> > effort to track drugs and non-aligned paramilitary groups in the
> > region. The United States, with its vast array of spy satellites
and
> > listening posts, monitors most of Latin America, Asia, Asiatic
Russia
> > and northern China. Britain listens in on Europe and Russia west
of
> > the Urals as well as Africa. Australia hunts for communications
> > originating in Indochina, Indonesia and southern China. New
Zealand
> > sweeps the western Pacific.
> >
> > Supporters stress that ECHELON is simply a method of sorting
captured
> > signals and is just one of the many arrows in the intelligence
> > community's quiver, along with increasingly sophisticated bugging
and
> > communications interception techniques, satellite tracking,
> > through-clothing scanning, automated biometric recognition systems
> > that can recognize faces, fingerprints & retina patterns.
> >
> > The U.S. communications-intelligence agency is the National
Security
> > Agency (NSA), which is headquartered at Fort Meade, just outside
> > Washington, DC. Although the NSA budget is classified[8], as of
1996
> > the agency was estimated to have a global staff of roughly 38,000
and
> > a budget of approximately US$3.6-billion[9]. The UK equivalent
> > organisation is the Government Communications Headquarters GCHQ
based
> > near Cheltenham. Further, smaller organisations exist to provide
> > communications technology and expertise (e.g. Her Majesty's
Government
> > Communication Centre HMGCC).
> >
> > By comparison, Canada's communications-intelligence operations are
> > conducted by the Communications Security Establishment (CSE), a
branch
> > of the Canadian Department of National Defence. It has a staff of
890
> > people and an annual budget of $110 million CAD[citation needed].
The
> > CSE's headquarters is the Sir Leonard Tilley Building on Heron
Road in
> > the nation's capital of Ottawa, Ontario, and its main
communications
> > intercept site is located on an old armed-forces radio base in
> > Leitrim, just south of Ottawa.
> >
> > On July 6, 2000 the BBC published an article called Echelon: Big
> > brother without a cause? that said:
> >
> > Critics accuse the United States' intelligence community and its
> > English-speaking partners of waging what is in effect a new Cold
War.
> > At stake are international contracts worth billions of dollars,
and at
> > the disposal of the spymasters is an intelligence gathering
system of
> > immense power. The Echelon spy system, whose existence has only
> > recently been acknowledged by US officials, is capable of
hoovering up
> > millions of phone calls, faxes and emails a minute. Its owners
insist
> > the system is dedicated to intercepting messages passed between
> > terrorists and organised criminals. But a report published by the
> > European Parliament in February alleges that Echelon twice helped
US
> > companies gain a commercial advantage over European firms. Duncan
> > Campbell, the British intelligence expert and journalist who
wrote the
> > report, raises the prospect that hundreds of US Department of
Commerce
> > "success stories", when US companies beat off European and
Japanese
> > commercial opposition, could be attributed to the filtering
powers of
> > Echelon. Echelon evolved out of Cold War espionage arrangements
set up
> > by the US and UK in 1948, and later bringing in Australia, Canada
and
> > New Zealand, in their capacity as Britain's Commonwealth
partners. The
> > biggest of Echelon's global network of listening posts is at
Menwith
> > Hill, North Yorkshire, where about 30 "giant golf balls" called
> > radomes litter the landscape. The system also boasts 120 American
> > satellites in geostationary orbit. Bases in the five countries are
> > linked directly to the headquarters of the secretive US National
> > Security Agency (NSA) headquarters at Fort Mead, Maryland. The
> > system's superpowerful voice recognition capability enables it to
> > filter billions of international communications for whatever key
words
> > or word patterns are programmed in. Mr Campbell believes that
when the
> > Cold War ended, this under-employed intelligence apparatus was
put to
> > use for economic gain. "There's no safeguards, no remedies, " he
said.
> > "There's nowhere you can go to say that they've been snooping on
your
> > international communications. It is a totally lawless world." The
> > journalist, who has spent much of his life investigating Echelon,
has
> > offered two alleged instances of US snooping in the 1990s, which
he
> > says followed the newly-elected Clinton administration's policy of
> > "aggressive advocacy" for US firms bidding for foreign contracts.
The
> > first came from a Baltimore Sun report which said the European
> > consortium Airbus lost a $6bn contract with Saudi Arabia after NSA
> > found Airbus officials were offering kickbacks to a Saudi
official.
> > The paper said the agency "lifted all the faxes and phone-calls
> > between Airbus, the Saudi national airline and the Saudi
Government"
> > to gain this information. Mr Campbell also alleges that the US
firm
> > Raytheon used information picked up from NSA snooping to secure a
> > $1.4bn contract to supply a radar system to Brazil instead of
France's
> > Thomson-CSF. The US strenuously denies passing on commercial
> > information to individual US firms, saying that there are clear
laws
> > to prevent it. But former CIA director James Woolsey, in an
article in
> > March for the Wall Street Journal, acknowledged that the US did
> > conduct economic espionage against its European allies, though he
did
> > not specify if Echelon was involved. However, he poured scorn on
the
> > Campbell allegations that the US was using its technological edge
to
> > gain unfair advantage in international business. "We have spied
on you
> > because you bribe," the ex-CIA boss wrote. "(European) products
are
> > often more costly, less technically advanced or both, than (their)
> > American competitors'. As a result (they) bribe a lot." But that
is
> > not an argument that will have much influence among concerned
European
> > countries, which are currently investigating the threat or
otherwise
> > posed by the world's most powerful intelligence-gathering machine.
[10]
> >
> > "The United States will occasionally have the United Kingdom keep
> > an eye on individuals in this country [meaning inside the US],
with
> > the understanding that if Britain turns up any interesting
tidbits, it
> > will slide them across the table." - from the book, "CHATTER:
> > Dispatches from the Secret World of Global Eavesdropping"
> >
> > [edit]
> >
> > Hardware
> >
> > According to an article in UK's Techworld, Echelon may be similar
to a
> > Texas Memory Systems SAM supercomputer, which incorporates a solid
> > state disk (SSD) and a digital signal processor (DSP)[11].
> >
> > Margaret Newsham claims that she worked on the configuration and
> > installation of some of the software that makes up the ECHELON
system
> > while employed at Lockheed Martin, for whom she worked from 1974
to
> > 1984 in Sunnyvale, California and in Menwith Hill, England[12]. At
> > that time, according to Newsham, the ECHELON system was based on a
> > VAX, and code named P415 . Its two main programs were called
SILKWORTH
> > and SIRE. A satellite named VORTEX would intercept communications.
> > Alongside VORTEX were NEXUS, SCOUT, and NOSTRADAMUS, widely
reputed to
> > be the first satellite deployed with a 64-bit processor.
> >
> > Jonathan Meier, in his acclaimed biography, has stated of his
time at
> > the NSA that:
> >
> > "Conjecture and speculation were rampant on the [ECHELON]
projects,
> > even internally. Truthfully, very few individuals were privy to
the
> > logistics involved."
> > [edit]
> >
> > Ground stations
> >
> > Some of the known or suspected ground stations belonging to or
> > participating in the ECHELON network include the following:
> > [edit]
> >
> > The largest and best-attested ground stations
> >
> > * Fort Meade (Maryland, US) (headquarters of NSA)
> > * Geraldton (Western Australia, Australia)
> > * Menwith Hill (Yorkshire, UK)
> > * Misawa Air Base (Japan)
> > * Morwenstow (Cornwall, UK)
> > * Pine Gap (Northern Territory, Australia - close to Alice
Springs)
> > * Sabana Seca (Puerto Rico - US)
> > * Shoal Bay (Northern Territory, Australia)
> > * Sugar Grove (West Virginia, US)
> > * Yakima (Washington, US) Map
> > * Waihopai (New Zealand)
> > * Tangimoana (New Zealand)
> > * Naval Communication Station Harold E. Holt (Western Australia,
> > Australia - close to Exmouth)
> >
> > [edit]
> >
> > Various other ground stations
> >
> > The following are various intelligence gathering stations of US
> > intelligence agencies and armed forces or their allies.
> >
> > * Alert (Ellesmere Island, Nunavut, Canada)
> > * Agios Nikolaos (Cyprus - UK)
> > * Bremerhaven (Germany - UK)
> > * Buckley Air Force Base (Colorado, US)
> > * RAF Chicksands (Bedfordshire, UK)
> > * Diego Garcia (Indian Ocean - US-UK)
> > * Digby (Lincolnshire, UK)
> > * Elmendorf Air Force Base (Alaska - US)
> > * Feltwell (Norfolk, UK)
> > * Fort Gordon (Georgia, US)
> > * Gander (Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada)
> > * Gibraltar (UK)
> > * Griesheim (near Darmstadt, Germany - US)
> > * Guam (Pacific Ocean, US)
> > * Karamursel (Turkey - US)
> > * Kunia (Hawaii, US)
> > * Leitrim (south of Ottawa, Canada)
> > * Malta (Malta - UK)
> > * Masset (British Columbia, Canada)
> > * Medina Annex (Texas, US)
> > * Osan Air Base (South Korea, US)
> > * Rota, Spain (Spain - US)
> > * Scampton (Lincolnshire, UK)