Germany officially starts spying on U.S.

The Daily Mail and Techdirt repot - Germany officially starts spying on U.S. (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2705537/Germany-starts-spying-U-S-Britain-time-end-Second-World-War.html, https://www.techdirt.com/articles/20140710/07112927839/germany-expels-top-us-intelligence-official-says-it-will-officially-spy-back-us-uk.shtml)
But I think the Germans have already the good sources in the American security circles otherwise how they discover that "up to 20 agents of the American government are operating inside the German federal bureaucracy" (http://www.bild.de/politik/inland/nsa/spionage-affaere-bundesrgierung-blaest-zur-agentenjagd-36800768.bild.html)

Big Brother in BND

As Spiegel has published new Snowden disclosures, Merkel's "dogs" are alarmed by the scandals and can activate their spy campaign.
It's not a secret that the Germans themselves are spying on the United States. They had known before about the leak because somebody warned the Germans. No doubt BND is trying to protect its source in the CIA.

http://www.volconvo.com/forums/global-politics/45894-spying-scandal-germany-big-brother-bnd.html

Retaliation for Spying: Germany Asks CIA Official to Leave Country

In what amounts to a diplomatic earthquake, Berlin has asked the country's top CIA official to leave Germany. The measures comes in response to the second allegation in a week of a German government employee spying for the US.
Marking its most vocal response yet to the United States for alleged spying and a tough new tone, the government in Berlin asked Washington's top CIA official in Germany to leave the country on Thursday. The news followed a meeting of the Parliamentary Control Panel (PKGR) in the federal parliament responsible for scrutiny of intelligence services.

Panel Chairperson Clemens Binninger said the request had been "a reaction to unsuccessful cooperation in the pursuit of clarification." The panel convened a special session on Thursday to discuss two cases of suspected spying by German government employees on behalf of the United States that have emerged during the past week. The first case involved an employee with Germany's foreign intelligence service. Last Friday, federal prosecutors in Germany said they had arrested the employee of the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND) foreign intelligence agency on suspicion he had acted as a spy against Germany by selling secrets to US intelligence agents, including documents pertaining to the special parliamentary committee investigating spying by the NSA in Germany.
And this Wednesday, the Federal Prosecutor's Office in Karlsruhe confirmed it is investigating a second case, based on suspicions that an employee with the Defense Ministry in Berlin may also have passed secrets on to the US.
The revelations of the past week show that, in addition to conducting signals intelligence to gather information on Germany, US intelligence agencies are also using human intelligence. They strongly suggest that US services in Germany continue to collect large amounts of intelligence, and all this despite the outrage over the NSA scandal and news in October 2013 that the Americans had been spying on Chancellor Merkel's mobile phone.

 More on http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/germany-asks-top-cia-official-to-leave-country-a-980372.html

The legal bearings...or International backlash against NSA spying

The diplomatic battle is playing out in an obscure U.N. General Assembly committee that is considering a proposal by Brazil and Germany to place constraints on unchecked internet surveillance by the National Security Agency and other foreign intelligence services. American representatives have made it clear that they won't tolerate such checks on their global surveillance network.

The Brazilian and German initiative seeks to apply the right to privacy, which is enshrined in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), to online communications. Their proposal affirms a "right to privacy that is not to be subjected to arbitrary or unlawful interference with their privacy, family, home, or correspondence." It notes that while public safety may "justify the gathering and protection of certain sensitive information," nations "must ensure full compliance" with international human rights laws.
A draft of the resolution calls on states to "to respect and protect the right to privacy," asserting that the "same rights that people have offline must also be protected online, including the right to privacy." It also requests the U.N. high commissioner for human rights, Navi Pillay, present the U.N. General Assembly next year with a report on the protection and promotion of the right to privacy, a provision that will ensure the issue remains on the front burner.

The privacy resolution, like most General Assembly decisions, is neither legally binding nor enforceable by any international court. But international lawyers say it is important because it creates the basis for an international consensus -- referred to as "soft law" -- that over time will make it harder and harder for the United States to argue that its mass collection of foreigners' data is lawful and in conformity with human rights norms.

To read more please follow this link

Leaked NOFORN 1981 in Media

Lessons from history (NOFORN 1981)

It was during Richard M. Nixon’s first presidential visit to Paris in 1969 that White House aide John D. Ehrlichman discovered that friends sometimes spy on friends.
After retrieving his coat from a butler in the official guest house one morning, Ehrlichman discovered a small pin with a listening device clumsily stuck in the lining, apparently by French intelligence agents.   
“I gave it to the Secret Service boys, and they shrugged,” Ehrlichman recalled this week. “It was business as usual.”
A secret 1981 message from the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) stamped “NOFORN” - meaning not to be shown to any foreigners - gives some indication of U.S. interest in friends as well as foes.
The message instructs military attaches and other intelligence officers to report on a continuing basis on the intelligence services of Canada, Israel, West Germany, Greece and 30 other nations, it demands “detailed information” on their “locations, operations, capabilities, intentions, effectiveness personnel, equipment, communications and capabilities, power and influence, procedures, funding and support (internal and external), training, doctrine and policy, uni-forms, insignia and credentials.”
“Information concerning operations, methods, influence, organization and general activities of the intelligence and security services of countries, which are either friendly or co-operating with the United States, has become highly important to army planning and Opsec.”

Nobody spying on Germany's leader

President Barack Obama didn't know the United States was collecting communications of allied leaders such as German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
With the latest revelations from Snowden threatening to roil diplomatic relations in Europe, South America and elsewhere, the Obama administration maintained its firm and consistent response to all seeking answers -- we're not admitting anything, but we'll change it for the better.
"I'm not here to talk about classified information. What I am confirming is the fact that we're undergoing a complete review of how our intelligence operates outside of the country," the President told Fusion TV.

"I'm not here to talk about classified information. What I am confirming is the fact that we're undergoing a complete review of how our intelligence operates outside of the country."
"We give them policy direction, but what we've seen over the last several years is their capacities continue to develop and expand, and that's why I'm initiating now a review to make sure that what they're able to do doesn't necessarily mean what they should be doing," the President said.

More: http://edition.cnn.com/2013/10/28/politics/white-house-stopped-wiretaps/