Echelon video available

This 40 minute long 1999 Australian documentary has never been shown on New Zealand TV, despite having extensive New Zealand content.

24 Apr 2000

Tuesday 25th January 2000 Campaign Against Foreign Control of Aotearoa (CAFCA) Press Release "Big Brother Is Listening"

This 40 minute long 1999 Australian documentary has never been shown on New Zealand TV, despite having extensive New Zealand content.

For the first time, one of the spy agencies (Australia's Defence Signals Directorate) admits that the UKUSA Agreement actually exists.

The programme looks at the work of the DSD in Australia (Geraldton, in Western Australia, is Waihopai's sister spybase); and at the network of such spybases across the globe.

It looks at (and gets ordered off) American facilities run by the biggest Big Brother, the US National Security Agency.

It talks to American experts; Australia's Inspector General of Intelligence and Security; and, most interestingly, to former US and Canadian spies. It spells out the increasing role these agencies are playing in spying on trade negotiations and business deals, in the interests of the big Powers and their transnational corporations.

There are major implications for NZ. It spends plenty of time talking to New Zealand's Nicky Hager, the world expert on UKUSA and its ECHELON programme (which automatically computer scans billions of phone calls, faxes, e-mail, etc, for key words).

Nicky, the author of the epochal book "Secret Power", sheds light on his research methods; and the programme goes right inside the Waihopai spybase. This is a groundbreaking documentary.

"Big Brother Is Listening" is available for hire from the Anti-Bases Campaign, Box 2258, Christchurch. It costs $10 (payable in advance), which includes postage, and can be hired for one week.