National Security Agency

A global cyber attack use hacking tools believed to have been developed by the U.S. National security Agency (NSA) hit tens of thousands of computers worldwide, reported Reuters.

The cyber hackers tricked victims into opening spam emails which appeared to contain security warnings, job offers and invoices.

The National Security Agency announced Friday it would end its controversial practice of sweeping up any email or text message an American exchanges with someone overseas that makes reference to a real target of NSA surveillance.

Documents and computer files released by hackers provide a blueprint for how the U.S. National Security Agency likely used weaknesses in commercially available software to gain access to the global system for transferring money between banks, a review of the data showed.

Germany’s foreign intelligence service BND spied on media e-mails, faxes and phone calls, including more than a dozen BBC numbers in London and Afghanistan, Spiegel news reported.

The surveillance, which began in 1999, also extended to Reuters news agency and the New York Times, it is alleged.

“We are disappointed to hear these claims,” a BBC spokesperson said.

Amid the ongoing uproar caused by the CIA’s assessment that Russian-baked hackers were responsible for the hacked DNC e-mails and their passing on to wikileaks, which influenced the elections in favour of Donald Trump, CBS news has revealed that Russian hackers struck at the heart of the U.S. military in August 2015 by seizing the e-mail system used by the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

A contractor for the National Security Agency has been arrested on charges that he illegally removed highly classified information and stored the material in his home and car, federal prosecutors said Oct. 5.

Yahoo Inc. last year secretly built a custom software program to search all of its customers' incoming emails for specific information provided by U.S. intelligence officials, according to people familiar with the matter. 

BELGRADE - Yahoo last year secretly built a custom software program to search all of its customers' incoming emails for specific information provided by U.S. intelligence officials, according to people familiar with the matter, Reuters reports.

Swiss voters approved a new surveillance law on Sept. 25, in a victory for the government which argued the security services needed enhanced powers in an increasingly volatile world. 

The German government confirmed on April 27 that Gerhard Schindler, the head of the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND) foreign intelligence agency, would leave his post two years early but provided no reason for the surprise change.