According to new details leaked to The Guardian (UK) by NSA leaker Edward Snowden, American and British intelligence directed snooping efforts against internet and phone data from foreign officials at the G20 in 2009. According to the documents, which were created by the NSA and handed over to the UK, Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev’s phone calls were bugged, and emails and calls from other delegates’ phones were monitored as well. Fake internet cafes were created to grab keystrokes from attendees. Forty-five analysts were given round-the-clock updates on who was calling whom at the summit. The Turkish finance ministers and others in his party were targeted as well.
According to the papers, the British GCHQ (the equivalent of the American NSA) wanted “to ensure that intelligence relevant to HMG’s desired outcomes for its presidency of the G20 reaches customers at the right time and in a form which allows them to make full use of it.” The documents mention information being handed to “ministers.”