Several senior NSA leaders visited NSA/CSS Hawaii. The facility is also upgrading its IT systems. 

The first video on governance is available for viewing. 

The NSA is trying to share more information within the intelligence community as recommended in the 9/11 Commission report. There are several factors that hamper information-sharing, including minimization rules, lack of bandwidth to transfer data, and training other agencies to understand signals intelligence.

At the end of 2005, the NSA faced a serious challenge in spying on Skype calls. Compared to traditional phone calls, Skype introduces issues with target identification, collection, tracking, and decryption. “At this time, SIGINT targets have a method to freely obscure their communications on the global Internet, thus hindering our ability to collect vital communications intelligence.”

Several NSA directors went to Norway, Denmark, and Sweden to talk about the countries’ electronic intelligence and foreign instrumentation signals-gathering capabilities. The Scandinavian partners would like U.S. tools and training so that the countries’ systems are compatible to ease information-sharing. 

A tool called “Quadra Spectre,” developed and deployed in Iraq, correlates text messages and provides “near real-time” location data on suspected insurgents, cutting “days of painstaking analysis to mere hours” and creating a “snowball effect” that helped lead, over 90 days in northern Iraq, to the killing or capture of “134 high-level insurgents and countless associates.”

Japan’s Directorate for SIGNIT, or DFS, found the replacement for a signal that benefited “many organizations” in the U.S. intelligence community but disappeared in 2002 or 2003. To honor this discovery, the NSA allowed DFS to name the new signal.

The NSA has been helping the Norwegian Intelligence Service, or NIS, develop Norway’s foreign satellite, or FORNSAT, collection and processing. By the end of 2005, the NIS will have capability comparable to an NSA FORNSAT field site. “NIS remains one of NSA's closest SIGINT allies.”

The story of the rescue of a Navy SEAL wounded in a Taliban ambush that killed three of his comrades is known from the book and movie “Lone Survivor.” But the NSA's signals intelligence assistance in the search-and-rescue mission is little known and described here.

There will be a brown bag session on new “social intelligence” skills needed for post-combat work to stabilize societies after military victory. 

Customer Account Managers coordinate communication with the agencies the NSA supports. Signals Intelligence Directorate staff need to keep their CAMs informed of their communications with members of these outside agencies. 

The Customer Relationships Directorate updates the rest of the Signals Intelligence Directorate on notable recent developments, including a restructuring to “more fully integrate NSA/CSS with the warfighter,” a close collaboration with GCHQ on the London bombings, and several promotions. 

The NSA is now exploring ways to use passports and other official identification cards as a form of signals intelligence. Some countries include a checksum with passport serial numbers, and passports from these countries with incorrect checksums are likely fraudulent. Venezuelan passports will be the first analyzed as part of this exploration. 

The outgoing commander of NSA/CSS Texas dispenses advice about life and leadership. 

The origins of U.S. Special Operations Command are described. NSA staff have a presence at the command to provide signals intelligence and other services. 

The NSA's data acquisition division has been working to review planning, resources, and mission alignment at 12 (or 23) data acquisition sites around the world.

The Signals Intelligence Directorate will host its first golf tournament. All golf teams must incorporate players with a variety of skill levels. 

Staff who have received a Star Award need to redeem it before it expires. 

Anonymous staffers give feedback on the question of whether promotions are or should be based on one’s performance in high-priority signals intelligence missions.

There are job vacancies at the Signals Intelligence Directorate’s new Counterterrorism Mission Management Center. 

The Collection Association’s membership has shrunk in recent times, but it still presents yearly awards and is seeking new members.

Assessment Reports bundle all available signals intelligence alongside an analyst’s interpretation of these intercepts as evidence. A report produced by the NSA’s Libya team in 2002 zeroed in on a Libyan intelligence officer, Mohamed Ismail. Years later, the report proved crucial when he was implicated in a plot to assassinate the Saudi crown prince, which in turn led to the conviction of an American co-conspirator, Abdurahman al-Amoudi.

NSA staff is aging, and most new hires for signals intelligence collection positions arrive at the agency with inadequate training. Human resources and others have formed a committee to determine what skills are needed for these jobs, and how to create viable career development plans to ensure that the NSA is staffed to collect intelligence in a decade.

Since 1996, a Cryptologic Services Group special liaison in Seoul has been sending out an informal daily email newsletter for NSA staff targeting North Korea. The newsletter is focused on key intelligence issues encountered by U.S. Forces Korea. The liaison staffer is hoping to turn the newsletter into a blog, but is “not sure NSA’s computer systems or philosophy is ready for such a thing.”

High-priority GSM data collected from Baghdad is sent to NSA Georgia. In late 2004, NSA Georgia reported that the delays in receiving this data hampered its ability to help troops on the ground in Iraq. The NSA made some changes to the tools used to select numbers to intercept and to the architecture in Baghdad, which has reduced these delays.

This NSA briefing from October 2006 underlines how the Alice Springs Resolution of 2004, designed to allow “unfettered” metadata sharing within the Five Eyes, was put into action in the aftermath of the 7/7 London bombings, with procedures for use of the resulting SMAC system: see the Intercept article How London’s 7/7 Bombings Led to […]

This undated GCHQ presentation, which includes speaking notes, outlines different techniques for contact chaining – moving from one contact to find all those associated with it: see the Intercept article How London’s 7/7 Bombings Led to “Unprecedented” Surveillance Tactics, 1 March 2018.

This 2 November 2009 post from the NSA internal newsletter SIDToday explains how agency resources are deployed in Afghanistan: see the Intercept article The Powerful Global Spy Alliance You Never Knew Existed, 1 March 2018.

This 2005 post from the NSA’s internal newsletter SIDToday describes how the relationship between the agency and its Czech counterpart USZI developed into a “third party relationship”: see the Intercept article NSA Used Porn to “Break Down Detainees” in Iraq — and Other Revelations From 297 Snowden Documents, 1 March 2018.

This 2005 post from the NSA’s internal newsletter SIDToday describes how the relationship between the agency and its Czech counterpart USZI developed into a “third party relationship”: see the Intercept article NSA Used Porn to “Break Down Detainees” in Iraq — and Other Revelations From 297 Snowden Documents, 1 March 2018.