UKUSA Agreement

[6] Much of the sharing of information is performed via the ultra-sensitive STONEGHOST network, which has been claimed to contain "some of the Western world's most closely guarded secrets".

[11] Shortly after its release, the seven-page UKUSA Agreement was recognized by Time magazine as one of the Cold War's most important documents, with immense historical significance.

[10] The global surveillance disclosure by Edward Snowden has shown that the intelligence-sharing activities between the First World allies of the Cold War are rapidly shifting into the digital realm of the Internet.

[14] The UKUSA Agreement connected the signal intercept networks of the UK Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) and the US National Security Agency (NSA) at the beginning of the Cold War.

[17] Under the agreement, the GCHQ and the NSA shared intelligence on the Soviet Union, the People's Republic of China, and several Eastern Bloc countries (known as Exotics).

In the aftermath of the 1973 Murphy raids on the headquarters of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO), the existence of the UKUSA Agreement was revealed to Australia's Prime Minister Gough Whitlam.

After learning about the agreement, Whitlam discovered that Pine Gap, a secret surveillance station close to Alice Springs, Northern Territory, had been operated by the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).

[19][20][21][22] At the height of the 1975 Australian constitutional crisis, the use and control of Pine Gap by the CIA was strongly opposed by Whitlam, who fired the chief of the ASIO before being dismissed as prime minister.

"[10] In July 2013, as part of the 2013 Edward Snowden revelations, it emerged that the NSA is paying GCHQ for its services, with at least £100 million of payments made between 2010 and 2013.

[33] On 11 September 2013, The Guardian released a leaked document provided by Edward Snowden which reveals a similar agreement between the NSA and Israel's Unit 8200.

[34] According to The Sydney Morning Herald, Australia operates clandestine surveillance facilities at its embassies "without the knowledge of most Australian diplomats".

[6][38] According to Edward Snowden, the NSA has a "massive body" called the Foreign Affairs Directorate that is responsible for partnering with other Western allies such as Israel.

As described by the news magazine Der Spiegel, this was done to circumvent domestic surveillance regulations: Britain's GCHQ intelligence agency can spy on anyone but British nationals, the NSA can conduct surveillance on anyone but Americans, and Germany's BND (Bundesnachrichtendienst) foreign intelligence agency can spy on anyone but Germans.