Wikileaks Reveals NSA Spying On French Presidents
from the is-that-really-a-big-deal? dept
Wikileaks has released some new documents showing that the NSA spied on the communications of a bunch of French Presidents.To be honest, as with the spying on leadership of other allies like Germany, I really don't think this is that big of a deal in reality. This is what intelligence services are supposed to be doing: spying on foreign governments. The revelations may make for some awkward diplomatic conversations, but you can bet that pretty much everyone knew this was going on already.The top secret documents derive from directly targeted NSA surveillance of the communications of French Presidents Francois Hollande (2012–present), Nicolas Sarkozy (2007–2012), and Jacques Chirac (1995–2007), as well as French cabinet ministers and the French Ambassador to the United States. The documents also contain the "selectors" from the target list, detailing the cell phone numbers of numerous officials in the Elysee up to and including the direct cell phone of the President.
Prominent within the top secret cache of documents are intelligence summaries of conversations between French government officials concerning some of the most pressing issues facing France and the international community, including the global financial crisis, the Greek debt crisis, the leadership and future of the European Union, the relationship between the Hollande administration and the German government of Angela Merkel, French efforts to determine the make-up of the executive staff of the United Nations, French involvement in the conflict in Palestine and a dispute between the French and US governments over US spying on France.
But, where this has the potential to get interesting is in the public perception. If the public gets angry about it, it can create international tensions, or lead to various other issues. But, on the whole, compared to spying on private citizens, it's difficult to get too outraged over spying on other governments -- even those deemed "friendly." You can bet the French are doing everything they can to spy back on the US as well.
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Filed Under: france, francois hollande, french presidents, jacques chirac, nicolas sarkozy, nsa, privacy, surveillance, wikileaks
Companies: wikileaks
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Half ass thinking seems to be severly contagious
Everyone else in the world: No, this is the correct use of resources on the intelligence community's part. For once.
Wikileaks: But... SPYING!
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Re: Half ass thinking seems to be severly contagious
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Re: Half ass thinking seems to be severly contagious
I know I'm not part of wikileaks.
I know I don't agree with the above.
Ergo: I am not of this world. I hear that time-traveling aliens can file DMCAs so am I one of those?
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It's In[ter]ception!
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Spying
Intelligence services are a function of the government. The POTUS is spying on someone he meets as an equal and ally at the table. Apparently the response of the government to the revelation is that it does not, and will not, spy on the French president
[anymore].
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Re: Spying
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Re: Spying
Nah, they'll just get France's own spy agencies to do that for them. Then the NSA will just do a little data swapping with them. Now, I wonder, what data could France's spies possibly want in exchange. Hmm...
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Re:
So pedophiles are the new gay/black? Remember that guy who got arrested because the FBI "injected" an ad on his browser?
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Re:
In politics, you want to know what the other person is thinking, what they're saying when you're not around, that sort of thing, so of course the spy agencies, all of them, are going to try and spy on highly placed politicians of other countries. Know what the other person is thinking, and you've got a solid advantage when it comes to bargaining with them.
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NSA spies on canadian prime ministers too!
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Like hell it is. Unless the Pentagon has probable cause to expect armed conflict with the French, then at best it's a gross misuse of resources and a PR disaster waiting to happen. At worst it's the kind of overtly hostile act that kills alliances, especially with people as historically touchy about sovereignity and policy independence as the French are.
The ghost of Eisenhower is facepalming very, very hard right now.
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What frenchs were sayong on radio this morning
I'm french, on the radio this morning ( RMC : http://rmc.bfmtv.com/), they put a pool so people could answer the question " do you still consider USA as our ally" 69% voted " NO ".
I'd like to remind you there is a the TFATA negociation in progress between USA and europe. I bet it's not gonna help at all and probably post pone it for years. Europeans are mostly against it but now we know the other part, the USA wants to f***** us .. and they cant deny it anymore.
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not supposed to have those
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Re: not supposed to have those
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Gratuitous use of the word *target*.
...
The White House did not comment on past activity, but said it was not targeting Hollande's communications and will not do so in the future.
...
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/in-nsa-intercepted-data-those-not-ta rgeted-far-outnumber-the-foreigners-who-are/2014/07/05/8139adf8-045a-11e4-8572-4b1b969b6322_story.ht ml
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In NSA-intercepted data, those not targeted far outnumber the foreigners who are
...
In other words - yes we have many hours of recordings of your public and private phone conversations but we didn't target you specifically so it's ok. See what we did there?
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Espionnage Elysee
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/s
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Re: france
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