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Maximator: European signals intelligence cooperation, from a Dutch perspective
This article is first to report on the secret European five-partner sigint alliance Maximator that started in the late 1970s. It discloses the name Maximator and provides documentary evidence. The five members of this European alliance are Denmark Sweden, Germany, the Netherlands, and France. The cooperation involves both signals analysis and crypto analysis. The Maximator alliance has remained secret for almost fifty years, in contrast to its Anglo-Saxon Five-Eyes counterpart. The existence of this European sigint alliance gives a novel perspective on western sigint collaborations in the late twentieth century.
The article explains and illustrates, with relatively much attention for the cryptographic details, how the five Maximator participants strengthened their effectiveness via the information about rigged cryptographic devices that its German partner provided, via the joint U.S.-German ownership and control of the Swiss producer Crypto AG of cryptographic devices.
1. Introduction
The post-Second World War signals intelligence (SIGINT) cooperation between five Anglo-Saxon countries – Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, and the United States – is well-documented.1 This alliance is often called Five Eyes and is based on the 1946 UKUSA Agreement. What is not publicly known so far is that there is a second, parallel, western signals intelligence alliance, namely in north-western Europe, also with five members. It has existed since 1976 and is called Maximator. It comprises Denmark, France, Germany, Sweden, and the Netherlands and is still active today.
The Maximator alliance deepens our understanding of the recently-revealed operation Thesaurus/Rubicon: the joint CIA-BND ownership and control of the Swiss manufacturer of cryptographic equipment Crypto AG, from 1970 to 1993.2 Crucial information about the inner workings (and weaknesses) of cryptographic devices sold by Crypto AG (and by other companies) were distributed within the Maximator network. This allowed the participants to decrypt intercepted messages from the more than one hundred countries that had bought compromised devices from the 1970s onwards.
👉🏼 Read more:
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02684527.2020.1743538
#Maximator #SIGINT #eu #cia #bnd #FiveEyes
📡@cRyPtHoN_INFOSEC_DE
📡@cRyPtHoN_INFOSEC_EN
📡@NoGoolag
📡@BlackBox
This article is first to report on the secret European five-partner sigint alliance Maximator that started in the late 1970s. It discloses the name Maximator and provides documentary evidence. The five members of this European alliance are Denmark Sweden, Germany, the Netherlands, and France. The cooperation involves both signals analysis and crypto analysis. The Maximator alliance has remained secret for almost fifty years, in contrast to its Anglo-Saxon Five-Eyes counterpart. The existence of this European sigint alliance gives a novel perspective on western sigint collaborations in the late twentieth century.
The article explains and illustrates, with relatively much attention for the cryptographic details, how the five Maximator participants strengthened their effectiveness via the information about rigged cryptographic devices that its German partner provided, via the joint U.S.-German ownership and control of the Swiss producer Crypto AG of cryptographic devices.
1. Introduction
The post-Second World War signals intelligence (SIGINT) cooperation between five Anglo-Saxon countries – Australia, Canada, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, and the United States – is well-documented.1 This alliance is often called Five Eyes and is based on the 1946 UKUSA Agreement. What is not publicly known so far is that there is a second, parallel, western signals intelligence alliance, namely in north-western Europe, also with five members. It has existed since 1976 and is called Maximator. It comprises Denmark, France, Germany, Sweden, and the Netherlands and is still active today.
The Maximator alliance deepens our understanding of the recently-revealed operation Thesaurus/Rubicon: the joint CIA-BND ownership and control of the Swiss manufacturer of cryptographic equipment Crypto AG, from 1970 to 1993.2 Crucial information about the inner workings (and weaknesses) of cryptographic devices sold by Crypto AG (and by other companies) were distributed within the Maximator network. This allowed the participants to decrypt intercepted messages from the more than one hundred countries that had bought compromised devices from the 1970s onwards.
👉🏼 Read more:
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02684527.2020.1743538
#Maximator #SIGINT #eu #cia #bnd #FiveEyes
📡@cRyPtHoN_INFOSEC_DE
📡@cRyPtHoN_INFOSEC_EN
📡@NoGoolag
📡@BlackBox
Taylor & Francis
Maximator: European signals intelligence cooperation, from a Dutch perspective
This article is first to report on the secret European five-partner sigint alliance Maximator that started in the late 1970s. It discloses the name Maximator and provides documentary evidence. The ...