CPJ troubled by report GCHQ targeted journalists
San Francisco, February 7, 2014–The Committee to Protect Journalists is deeply troubled by a report that a potential operation by the British intelligence agency Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) involved covert surveillance of reporters’ communications. GCHQ sought to use journalists to pass both information and disinformation to intelligence targets, according to documents taken from the National…
Correa steps up fight; hacking alleged on both sides
Seven months after Ecuadoran President Rafael Correa flirted with the idea of offering asylum to former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden, intercepted communications and leaked emails are again making headlines in the Andean country. This time, the story is not about international surveillance but a window onto the latest front in the ever-escalating war…
Obama’s legacy on the line with surveillance policy
When President Obama takes the lectern to discuss U.S. surveillance policy, as he is expected to do Friday, those hoping for sweeping reform are likely to be disappointed. As reported in The New York Times, the president appears poised to reject many of the recommendations of his Review Group on Intelligence and Communications Technologies, a…
On Internet freedom, India’s perilous trajectory
By the time the first story based on former NSA contractor Edward Snowden’s disclosures splashed across the front pages of the world’s newspapers, India had reportedly begun deployment of its own major surveillance architecture, the Central Management System (CMS). The system is a $132 million project that allows central access to all communications content and…
A chill over British press
A prime minister says a newspaper has damaged national security and calls for its editor to be brought before Parliament; his government tells the same paper there has been “enough” debate on an issue and sends its security officials into the paper’s offices to smash discs containing journalistic material; lawmakers call for the editor’s prosecution…
British journalists concerned by regulation, hostile climate
As Alan Rusbridger appears Tuesday before the Home Affairs committee of the U.K. Parliament to give evidence regarding the Guardian’s coverage of surveillance activities by the U.S. and U.K. governments, British journalists and analysts say that newspaper’s legal troubles are worrying in large part because they come against the backdrop of increased regulation and scrutiny…