LANGLEY, Va. — The Central Intelligence Agency has received authorization to spy on terrorists and other threats to national security on the websites of MySpace and AOL, some 15 years after requesting access, Duffel Blog has learned.
The requests were part of an effort by the intelligence community after the Sep. 11 terrorist attacks to collect information on future terrorist plots, though they were still marred by infighting between rival agencies prior to the attacks. Lukas Berg, a CIA analyst overseeing terror financing, requested congressional authorization to access data from AOL in early 2002, then asked for access to the data of MySpace, which became popular in 2003.
However, the National Security Agency claimed it was its responsibility to exploit AOL and MySpace, and blocked the CIA’s move, arguing that cyber spying was a form of signals intelligence. The CIA countered that spying on humans using computers was clearly human intelligence, the CIA’s mission.
