As a Satisfied Reader of David Kahn's

Thu, Feb 9, 2006

The Codebreakers, I was alarmed to read this from James Bamford:

What greatly concerns me as someone who has written more about NSA than any other writer is that in the past, when NSA was allowed to operate in absolute secrecy, without oversight, it became a rogue agency. When the agency discovered that another author, David Kahn, was planning to include a chapter about the agency in his book on the history of cryptology, The Codebreakers , they secretly placed his name on their watchlist and began monitoring his communications. According to an investigation by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, they even considered breaking into his New York house to conduct “clandestine service applications.” It may never be known how many other authors and journalists were targeted back then. But with the Justice Department only willing to go after The New York Times whistleblower, and not the agency that continues to violate the FISA law, the ACLU lawsuit seems like the only way to find out who’s being targeted today.