This isn't entirely operational in nature, but if true does
somewhat have an impact on what we are operating. You can find the
entire text at www.wired.com/news/news/politics/story/15295.html
but here are a few snippets to give you an idea of what it's about.
"In October, Europe's governing body will commission a full report into
the workings of Echelon, a global network of highly sensitive listening
posts operated in part by America's most clandestine intelligence
organization, the National Security Agency. "
"Echelon is reportedly able to intercept, record, and translate any
electronic communication -- telephone, data, cellular, fax, email, telex
-- sent anywhere in the world. "
"Echelon intercepts Internet traffic at the transport layer, such as the
TCP/IP layer, so the system doesn't care too much what it is or where it
came from," said Pike. "For analog traffic, such as telephone
conversations, it uses automatic voice-recognition technology to scan the
conversations."
Seems far fetched (but not *that* far), but worth a read.
Barry
