Information : I was in the Canadian air cadets back in 1982, at that time myself and a group of other cadets were taken on a tour of McChord Air Force Base in washington state. At one point in the tour we were taken to a large building with antenna towers and dishes on the outside. We were taken to a control centre of some type with (if I remember correctly) three Air Force personnel sitting at stations with headphones on. One of them told us this was a listening post, one of many across the states that intercepted ALL phone calls, radio communications and other communications. He told us they would search the transmissions for keywords like "terrorist", "bomb" etc. using a computer. At the time, being 12 years old and rather naive, I didn't think it was something to be concerned about. Of course, in retrospect, it amazes me that the US government was so cavalier as to bring in a group of children and tell them, in essence, they were being spied upon! I can't fathom now why they would take that kind of a risk of exposing what was and is an obvious legal violation of massive proportions.

Maybe it was because we were "canadian" so they didn't think we would be a risk. It still baffles me in hindsight to this day. This was 1982, who knows how long they've been doing this! This was Echelon before there was Echelon as far as I know. I'll never forget the matter-of-fact attitude of the guy that spoke to us, it was all "run of the mill" to him. The question I have, cliched as it is, is: "who watches the watchers?" Maybe they had other keywords in their searches as well, like: "protest", "tax evasion" or "corrupt government". Who knows? It's pretty unnerving when you consider the implications. Hope you found this helpful.