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One of the key players during the Snowden affair was Director of National Intelligence James Clapper . He is responsible for coordinating all 16 American intelligence agencies, a role which is reflected by the number and the types of telephone equipment in his office. Clapper has six phones, more than for example the director of the NSA, or the Defense Secretary. Here we will take a close look at these telecommunication devices used by the US Director of National Intelligence. The office of Director of National Intelligence (DNI) was created in 2004, after the 9/11 Commission Report recommended a stronger and separate leadership for the US intelligence community. Before, it was the director of the CIA who acted as Director of Central Intelligence (DCI) in order to coordinate the various intelligence agencies. Australian foreign affairs minister Kevin Rudd (right) meeting DNI James Clapper (left) (Photo: Australian Foreign Affairs Department - Click to enlarge) The telecommunications...

On July 24, the US National Archives released a series of 356 never-before-seen photos, most of them taken on September 11, 2001 inside the emergency bunker under the White House. The bunker is officially called the Presidential Emergency Operations Center (PEOC), but White House officials also call it the shelter. It was constructed in 1942 underneath the East Wing of the White House, which was primarily built to cover the building of the bunker. It is said the PEOC can withstand the blast overpressure from a nuclear detonation. One of the very few photos from inside the PEOC available before the recent release (White House photo - Click to enlarge) The photos were released in response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request filed by Colette Neirouz Hanna, coordinating producer for the FRONTLINE documentary film team. They focus on the reaction from then-vice president Dick Cheney and other Bush administration officials during the terrorist attacks. How Cheney reached ...

(Updated: September 29, 2014) After a range of articles about how NSA intercepts foreign communications, we now take a look at the equipment that NSA uses to secure their own telecommunications, more specific those of its director. We can do this because last December, the CBS program 60 Minutes offered some unprecedented insights into the NSA headquarters. Of course very limited, but still interesting for those with a sharp eye. Perhaps the most revealing was that for the first time ever it was shown how the office of the director of NSA looks like: The office of NSA director Alexander, December 2013 (click to enlarge) The office of the director is at a corner on the eighth floor of the OPS 2B building, which is the wider and lower one of the two black mirrored glass structures of the NSA headquarters at Fort George G. Meade . Contrary to what many people would probably expect, the director's office is far from high tech. We see a rather traditional interior with a classic woode...

Last week, David Petraeus resigned as director of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), after admitting he had an extramarital affair with his biographer Paula Broadwell. This led to many news reports and also many pictures on the internet. Some of them give a nice look at the telecommunications equipment which general Petraeus used when, from July 2010 to July 2011, he was commander of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Kabul, Afghanistan: ISAF Commander Petraeus being interviewed by Paula Broadwell (Photo: paulabroadwell.com, date unknown) In this picture we see the following telecommunication devices: Video conferencing screens On Petraeus' desk we see two Centric 1700 MXP video teleconferencing screens, made by the Norwegian manufacturer Tandberg . In 2010 this company was bought by Cisco Systems, and so the 1700 MXP screens are often used by US military officials. They are equipped with a HD camera and have a widescreen LCD screen, which operates both a...