Crypto AG Unmasked: CIA Spied on Governments For Decades

From infosecurity-magazine.com

A Swiss company thought to have sold among the most secure encryption products in the world was actually owned by US and German intelligence, allowing the CIA and BND to spy on allies and enemies around the world, it has emerged.

A new report from The Washington Post and Germany’s ZDF claims that Crypto AG, founded during the Second World War, struck a deal with the CIA in the 50s and then passed fully into the hands of US and German intelligence two decades later, before being wound up in 2018.

Internal reports about the operation, codenamed “Thesaurus” and then renamed “Rubicon” in the 80s, reportedly claim it was “the intelligence coup of the century.”

“Foreign governments were paying good money to the US and West Germany for the privilege of having their most secret communications read by at least two (and possibly as many as five or six) foreign countries,” the article claimed.

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