The Russians Are Bugging

RUSS MONITOR U.S. PHONES, blared the Chicago Tribune last week, head lining its scoop that the Soviet Union has been listening in on domestic telephone conversations, no doubt including those of Government, business and military leaders. Up to 70% of U.S. phone calls are carried by microwave, and the Soviets have set up parabolic receivers on their Molynia communications satellites in the skies over the U.S. and on the ground to intercept and record the microwave transmissions. All this should come as little sur prise, since the U.S. and U.S.S.R. have engaged in such mutual electronic spookery for years. The Russians have merely caught up with the American capability to pick out by computer, needle-in-a-haystack style, interesting conversations from the many thousands bunched together in a single microwave burst. But sensitive U.S. Government phone calls are scrambled or coded, or both; codes are changed often. Adds an official of the National Security Agency, which supervises the U.S.'s electronic surveillance: "What hasn't penetrated the Soviets' system yet, apparently, is the hard fact that truly sensitive stuff is never discussed on tele phones here."

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