Sept. 5, 2024

How We Found Bin Laden: The Basics of Foreign Signals Intelligence

Osama bin Laden helped plan the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 which killed nearly 3,000 Americans. To find him, the U.S. government had to put its best people on the job. Along with their counterparts across multiple agencies, experts at the National Security Agency answered the call. NSA generated foreign signals intelligence to help find, and ultimately eliminate, the terrorist leader. In the lead episode of No Such Podcast, learn how NSA helped find bin Laden through foreign signals intelligence (SIGINT), one of the Agency’s two core missions. NSA leaders demystify the foreign SIGINT cycle and how each step applied to the Osama bin Laden case. Learn from a counterterrorism expert who was in the room when the word came in that Osama bin Laden was Killed In Action. NSA’s foreign signals intelligence has informed United States policymakers for over seven decades.
 

Check out the episode wherever you get your podcasts:

Sept. 3, 2024

NSA Director Appoints Sara Siegle as Chief, Strategic Communications

FORT MEADE, Md. – General Timothy D. Haugh, Director of the National Security Agency (NSA), announced that Sara Siegle has been appointed as the NSA’s Chief, Strategic Communications and Senior Executive Advisor to the Board of Directors. In this role, Siegle will enhance the overall communications vision and strategy for the Agency, and will be responsible for leading a global workforce of communications professionals. Siegle previously served as NSA’s Reauthorization Lead for Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) and Chief of the Authorities Integration Group. In these positions, she played a critical role in the recent reauthorization of Section 702 of FISA, while ensuring NSA's application of mission authorities was consistent with law and policy.

Aug. 31, 2024

No Such Puzzle: Bite-sized Sudoku

In honor of #InternationalSudokuDay on September 9, for each #NoSuchPuzzle this month, we give you a bite-sized Sudoku. Find the numbers along the two main diagonals from upper left to lower right followed by lower left to upper right. Can you solve the Sudoku?

Aug. 29, 2024

NSA to Launch ‘No Such Podcast,’ Pulling Back Curtain on Mission, Culture, People

The National Security Agency (NSA) is launching a podcast on September 5 to share the stories of the world's best codemakers and codebreakers.

Aug. 27, 2024

Robots on the Plains: NSA Helps Native Students Engage in Cybersecurity Learning

Last month, National Security Agency (NSA) affiliates traveled to North Dakota’s Turtle Mountain Indian Reservation to teach Native high school students about programming, cybersecurity, and robotics.

Aug. 26, 2024

NSA releases copy of internal lecture delivered by computing giant Rear Adm. Grace Hopper

FORT MEADE, Md. — In one of the more unique public proactive transparency record releases for the National Security Agency (NSA) to date, NSA has released a digital copy of a lecture that then-Capt. Grace Hopper gave agency employees on August 19, 1982.

Aug. 21, 2024

NSA Joins Allies in Releasing Best Practices for Event Logging

FORT MEADE, Md. – To help owners and operators of NSS, DoD, and the DIB protect against malicious actors using living off the land (LOTL) techniques, the National Security Agency (NSA) is joining the Australian Signals Directorate’s Australian Cyber Security Centre (ASD ACSC) and international co-authors in releasing “Best Practices for Event Logging and Threat Detection,” a Cybersecurity Information Sheet (CSI).

Aug. 10, 2024

No Such Puzzle: Tap Codes

The tap code, sometimes called the knock code, is a way to encode text messages on a letter-by-letter basis. It has been used by prisoners to communicate with each other by tapping metal bars inside a cell. For each No Such Puzzle in August, we provide a tap sequence and an indicator for the number of words in the answer and their lengths. Can you solve the code and identify the prison or prisoner of war camp?

Aug. 6, 2024

Headline Puzzle: August 2024

The Headline Puzzle is a monthly feature that was started in 1964 by Paul Derthick, a longtime research analyst in NSA’s Operations Organization, as an interesting way to keep his mind sharp outside of his cryptanalytic work. Each Headline Puzzle contains five headlines from recent daily newspapers. Each of the five is a different monoalphabetic substitution, and all five are derived from the same mixed alphabet at different settings against itself. A complete solution includes recovering the plaintext of each HEADLINE and three key words, the SETTING, the KEY and the HAT.

July 30, 2024

NSA Publishes Enduring Security Framework Document Providing Recommendations for U.S. Government, Industry, and Academia to Engage Standards Development Organizations

FORT MEADE, Md. – As technology continues to develop at an increasingly rapid pace, the U.S. needs to participate in and position itself as the leader in the creation of global standards, according to an Enduring Security Framework (ESF) report released today by the National Security Agency (NSA) and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA).