Economic intelligence

Chancellor's office 'knew' of US economic spying

… "It was definitely known for years in the chancellery that the NSA tried, with German help, to monitor German companies," Bild quoted an unidentified source from the Bundestag (German parliament) NSA inquiry committee as saying. "It is unlikely and would be highly unusual if the head of the chancellery would not have been informed about such an occurrence," the source added.

Brave soldiers

My Father, the Spy in the Hanoi Hilton

The late Vice Admiral James B. Stockdale was flying a mission over North Vietnam on September 9, 1965, when his plane was struck by enemy fire. He ejected from the aircraft and parachuted into a tiny North Vietnamese village, where he was taken prisoner by the NVA in the Hoa Lo Prison (otherwise known as the Hanoi Hilton). He was imprisoned there for seven and a half years, and was tortured and beaten regularly. Once, when told he’d be paraded about in public and used as NVA propaganda, mutilated himself by slitting his face with a straight razor.

Useful spy hardware

From Spy Satellite to Dark Matter Scourer

NASA has two Hubble-magnitude telescopes from the NRO, and they want to use them to hunt exoplanets and dark matter

NASA is fast at work on plans for its next generation optics. While the James Webb Space Telescope is the headline grabber, the agency has another plan straight out of the Cold War: they're going to recycle two satellites given to them by the National Reconnaissance Office to peer deep into the universe.If the NRO is unfamiliar to you, it shouldn't be: it's the spy agency watching the world from above, with spy satellites zipping in orbit snapping pictures of the sky below.

Adapting to new realities

New spy powers not so scary: Stephen Harper adviser

Planned new powers for Canada’s spy agency seem scarier than they really are, says Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s national security adviser.Giving the Canadian Security Intelligence Service the ability to disrupt extremist plots will help squelch such dangerous activity at a very early stage, Dick Fadden told the Senate national security committee on Monday.Opponents of the government’s anti-terrorism bill have denounced the idea of allowing the spy service to go beyond gathering information to actively derailing suspected schemes.