ECHELON: How the UKUSA Network Turns an Intelligence Alliance Into Cross-Border Surveillance

In 2001, the European Parliament published a report on an interception system called ECHELON. The report concluded that the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand had run a global interception system together for a period of time. The report did not rest on one rumor. It combined declassified documents, testimony from people who had worked in intelligence, technical research, and hearings. The name ECHELON may cover the whole system or only one part of it.

These five countries are known as the Five Eyes. They are bound by the UKUSA agreement, a signals-intelligence partnership formed after the Second World War. Signals intelligence means collecting and analyzing communications: telephone calls, radio, satellite links, cables, and digital data. The agreement divides the work. One country has a place to put a listening station. Another has the equipment, or speakers of the languages worth hearing, or the right to enter one communications route. The five countries then share what they find.