The French intelligence agency has been accused of spying its citizens’ phone calls, emails and internet activities similar to the US National Security Agency’s (NSA) surveillance programme, Prism.
The French newspaper Le Monde reported that the country’s foreign intelligence agency and the Direction Generale de la Securite Exterieure gathers and records the data sent by computer servers and telephones in France.
Le Monde notes that the authorities also collect communications data between France and other countries.
According to the newspaper, the authorities collect the phone records of millions of subscribers including the identifier of the call, place, date, time and the weight of the message.
All Internet activities including the websites of Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple and Yahoo have also been tapped as part of their signals intelligence operations.
The report comes after recent revelations that the US NSA regularly spies on its citizens and also on European Union premises.
Recently, it was revealed that UK intelligence agency Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) has tapped fibre-optic cables, which carry vast amounts of Internet and communications data and shared it with the NSA.
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