Venona


The U.S. Army's Signal Intelligence Service, the precursor to the National Security Agency, began a secret program in February 1943 later codenamed VENONA

The mission of this small program was to examine and exploit Soviet diplomatic communications but after the program began, the message traffic included espionage efforts as well.

Although it took almost two years before American cryptologists were able to break the KGB encryption, the information gained through these transactions provided U.S. leadership insight into Soviet intentions and treasonous activities of government employees until the program was canceled in 1980.

The VENONA files are most famous for exposing Julius (code named LIBERAL) and Ethel Rosenberg and help give indisputable evidence of their involvement with the Soviet spy ring.

The first of six public releases of translated VENONA messages was made in July 1995 and included 49 messages about the Soviets' efforts to gain information on the U.S. atomic bomb research and the Manhattan Project. Over the course of five more releases, all of the approximately 3,000 VENONA translations were made public.

ImageTitle
 27SEP_COURIER.PDFCourier packages 27 September 1943 (Release 4)
 13AUG_COURIER_PROCEDURES.PDFCourier procedures, security of covernames 13 August 1943 (Release 4)
 4SEP_COURIER_SHIPMENT.PDFCourier shipment of secret and top secret packages 4 September 1943 (Release 4)
 3JAN_BORIS_MORROS.PDFCover business of Boris Morros and Alfred K. Stern
 3APR_COVERNAME_ZHAK.PDFCovername "ZhAK"; ASSISTENT not compromised; "IRINA" has made his acquaintance 3 April 1942 (Release 5)
 8APR_ADA.PDFCovername ADA
 29JAN_ALEKSANDR.PDFCovername ALEKSANDR mentioned
 2FEB_BOET.PDFCovername BOET's report on Landau and Lasky
 20MAR_BRUSOV.PDFCovername BRUSOV reports about Bell Aircraft Corp
 17JAN_COVERNAME_BUTCHER.PDFCovername BUTCHER of opinion that Leo Levanes (Shell Oil Company) will help the KGB. KGB officer Olga Khlopkova now has a direct cipher link.
 31AUG_COVERNAME_COOKIE.PDFCovername Cookie 31 August (Release 4)
 27FEB_ENEMIGO.PDFCovername ENEMIGO
 14MAR_ENEMIGO_WIFE.PDFCovername ENEMIGO and his wife 14 March (Release 4)
 1APR_FORBES.PDFCovername FORBES reports about a task assigned to U.S. Army & Navy 1 April 1943 (Release 4)
 28JUN_COVERNAME_FRENK.PDFCovername FRENK
Page 44 of 100