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
 14NOV_REF_TO_FORMER.PDF"VEST" 14 November (Release 5)
 23NOV_VESTS_ARRIVAL_BULGARIA.PDF"VEST'S" arrival in Bulgaria and meetings with "DEVUShKA" 23 November (Release 5)
 15DEC_VESTS_DEVUSHKA.PDF"VEST'S" work with "DEVUShKA" 15 December (Release 5)
 8JUL_VIKTOR.PDF"VIKTOR" gets a telegram from the Ambassador of the "COUNTRY" 8 July 1943 (Release 2)
 7JUL_VIKTOR.PDF"VIKTOR" gets information from a "SERGEJ" report 7 July 1943 (Release 2)
 1MAR_VIKTOR.PDF"VIKTOR" informed of "LEONID's" arrival in Mexico City
 19DEC_YUREV_SIGNATORY.PDF"YUR'EV" Signatory 19 December (Release 5)
 17JUL_ZAYATS.PDF"ZAYaTs" hands over document information from "SIDON" Sources 17 July 1943 (Release 2)
 12DEC_ZENITS_DEPARTURE.PDF"ZENIT'S" departure for Moscow delayed; Office handed over to :"FEDOR" 12 December (Release 5)
 22JUL_PAYMENT.PDF$650.00 payment to …TAS 22 July 1943 (Release 2)
 9JUN_2ND_RELEASE.PDF(A more complete version of documents previously released in second venona release on 10 Oct 1995) 9 June 1943 (Release 6)
 29JAN_EMPLOYMENT_SPECIAL_TASKS.PDF[NAME BV]: Employment on Special Tasks, Recall Inexpedient; Replacement Trainees Required; [NAME DV's] Work on a Tale; STIG, AKSEL'
 24MAR_DON_MAVRICIO_FRIEDMAN.PDF• 2000 American dollars transferred to the NEAR NEIGHBORS 24 March (Release 5)
 15MAR_KNUDSEN_OLSEN.PDF• An advance of money for KNUDSEN; and Query about OLSEN 15 March 1942 (Release 5)
 17MAR_MEETING_WITH_ANDRE.PDF• Arrangements for a meeting with ANDRE; Reference to MIKhAJLOV; and VIKTORIA's posting to the Dominions to be Challenged 17 March 1942 (Release 5)
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