NSA Internet Spying Aided by 'Highly Collaborative' 'Partnership' With AT&T, N.Y. Times Reports

National Security Agency Internet spying has been aided by a "highly collaborative" "partnership" with AT&T, the New York Times reported, citing newly disclosed NSA documents.

In this June 6, 2013 file photo, a sign stands outside the National Security Agency (NSA) campus in Fort Meade, Md. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky, File)

The new information shows the NSA's decades-long relationship with AT&T has been "considered unique and especially productive," the Times reported, adding that one document in particular noted the telecommunication company's “extreme willingness to help” the agency.

More from the Times:

AT&T’s cooperation has involved a broad range of classified activities, according to the documents, which date from 2003 to 2013. AT&T has given the N.S.A. access, through several methods covered under different legal rules, to billions of emails as they have flowed across its domestic networks. It provided technical assistance in carrying out a secret court order permitting the wiretapping of all Internet communications at the United Nations headquarters, a customer of AT&T.

The N.S.A.’s top-secret budget in 2013 for the AT&T partnership was more than twice that of the next-largest such program, according to the documents. The company installed surveillance equipment in at least 17 of its Internet hubs on American soil, far more than its similarly sized competitor, Verizon. And its engineers were the first to try out new surveillance technologies invented by the eavesdropping agency.

One document reminds N.S.A. officials to be polite when visiting AT&T facilities, noting, “This is a partnership, not a contractual relationship.”

The documents came from former NSA contractor Edward Snowden and were reviewed by the Times and ProPublica, the Times said. The NSA, AT&T and Verizon declined to comment, the paper added.

Read the entire report from the Times here.

(H/T: The Huffington Post)

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