NSA origins and secrecy described in House Oversight document

Prologue Snowden’s Trail: Hong Kong, 2014 T" NATIONAL SECURITY AGENCY, or, as it is now commonly called, the NSA, was created on October 24, 1952, in such a tight cocoon of secrecy that even the presidential order creating it was classified top secret. When journalists asked questions about this new agency, Washington officials jokingly told them that the initials NSA stood for “No Such Agency.” The reason for this extraordinary stealth is that the NSA is involved in a very sensitive enterprise. Its job is to intercept, decode, and analyze foreign electronic com- munications transmitted around the globe over copper wires, fiber- optic cable, satellite, microwave relays, cell phone towers, wireless transmissions, and the Internet for specified intelligence purposes. In intelligence jargon, its product is called COMINT, which stands for communications intelligence. Because this form of intelligence gath- ering is most effective when the NSA’s targets are unaware of the state-of-the-art tools the NSA uses to break into their computers and telecommunications channels to first intercept and then decrypt | | Epst_9780451494566_2p_all_rt.zindd 3 ® 929N6 5:51 Pa | | HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_019491