The NSA BULLRUN Decryption Program

Bullrun or BULLRUN is the code name of a clandestine, highly-classified decryption program run by the United States National Security Agency (NSA). The British signals intelligence agency GCHQ has a similar program codenamed Edgehill.

According to the NSA's BULLRUN Classification Guide, which was published by The Guardian, BULLRUN is not a Sensitive Compartmented Information (SCI) control system or compartment, but the codeword has to be shown in the classification line, after all other classification and dissemination markings.
Access to the program is limited to a group of top personnel at the Five Eyes (FVEY), NSA and the signals intelligence agencies of Britain, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand. [see "Five Eyes, below] Signals that cannot be decrypted with current technology may be retained indefinitely while the agencies continue to attempt to decrypt them.

Through the NSA-designed Clipper chip and the Skipjack algorithm it implemented, CALEA, the Cyberspace Electronic Security Act and restrictions on the export of encryption software, the U.S. government had publicly attempted in the 1990s to ensure its access to communications and ability to decrypt. The government's promotion of key escrow, a euphemism for a backdoor, had met with criticism and little success. Beginning in 2000, as encryption tools were gradually blanketing the Web, the NSA invested billions of dollars in a clandestine campaign to preserve its ability to eavesdrop. It set out to stealthily influence and weaken encryption standards and obtain master keys—either by agreement, by force of law, or by computer network exploitation (hacking). The NSA also relies on hardware-accelerated decryption for brute-force attacks. Information about the program's existence was leaked in 2013 by Edward Snowden.

Etymology
The name "BULLRUN" was taken from the First Battle of Bull Run, the first major battle of the American Civil War. Its predecessor "Manassas", is both an alternate name for the battle and where the battle took place. "EDGEHILL" is from the Battle of Edgehill, the first battle of the English Civil War.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullrun_(decryption_program)

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Five Eyes
The United Kingdom – United States of America Agreement (UKUSA, ew-koo-SAH) is a multilateral agreement for cooperation in signals intelligence between the United Kingdom, the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. The alliance of intelligence operations is also known as Five Eyes (FVEY). It was first signed in March 1946 by the United Kingdom and the United States and later extended to encompass the three Commonwealth realms of Canada, Australia and New Zealand. The UKUSA
Agreement was a follow-up of the 1943 BRUSA Agreement, the World War II agreement on cooperation over intelligence matters. This was a secret treaty, allegedly so secret that it was kept secret from the Australian Prime Ministers until 1973.

The agreement established an alliance of five English-speaking countries for the purpose of sharing intelligence, especially signals intelligence. It formalized the intelligence sharing agreement in the Atlantic Charter, signed in 1941, before the entry of the U.S. into the conflict.

History
The agreement originated from a ten-page British–U.S. Communication Intelligence Agreement, also known as BRUSA, that connected the signal intercept networks of the U.K. Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) and the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) at the beginning of the Cold War.

The document was signed on March 5, 1946 by Colonel Patrick Marr-Johnson for the U.K.'s Lonon Signals Intelligence Board and Lieutenant General Hoyt Vandenberg for the U.S. State-Army-Navy Communication Intelligence Board. Although the original agreement states that the exchange would not be "prejudicial to national interests", the United States often blocked information sharing from Commonwealth countries. The full text of the agreement was released to the public on June 25, 2010.

Under the agreement, the GCHQ and the NSA shared intelligence on the Soviet Union, the People’s Republic of China, and several eastern European countries (known as Exotics). The network was expanded in the 1960s into the Echelon collection and analysis network.

In July 2013, as part of the 2013 Edward Snowden revelations, it emerged that the NSA is paying GCHQ for its services, with at least £100 million of payments made between 2010–13.

Collection Mechanisms
The UKUSA alliance is often associated with the ECHELON system; however, processed intelligence is reliant on multiple sources of information and the intelligence shared is not restricted to signals intelligence.
The "Five Eyes" in question are –

• USA – National Security Agency
• United Kingdom – Government Communications Headquarters
• Canada – Communicaions Security Establishment
• Australia – Defence Signals Directorate
• New Zealand – Government Communications Security Bureau

Global Coverage
Each member of the UKUSA alliance is officially assigned lead responsibility for intelligence collection and analysis in different parts of the globe.

Australia]

Australia hunts for communications originating in Indochina, Indonesia, and southern China.

Canada

Formerly the northern portions of the former Soviet Union and conducting sweeps of all communications traffic that could be picked up from embassies around the world. In the post-Cold War era, a greater emphasis has been placed on monitoring satellite, radio and cellphone traffic originating from Central and South America, primarily in an effort to track drugs and non-aligned paramilitary groups in the region.

New Zealand

New Zealand is responsible for the western Pacific. Listening posts in the South Island at Waihopai Valley just south-west of Blenheim, and on the North Island at Tangimoana. The Anti-Bases Campaign holds regular protests in order to have the listening posts closed down.

United Kingdom

Europe, Africa, and European Russia.

United States

Monitors most of Latin America, Asia, Asiatic Russia and northern China.

Controversy
During the 2013 NSA leaks cyber spying scandal, the surveillance agencies have been accused of intentionally spying on one another's citizens and willingly sharing the collected information with each other, allegedly circumventing laws preventing each agency from spying on its own citizens.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_Eyes