Photo Gallery Data 'Made in Germany'

German cooperation with the NSA is much closer than first thought. Germany's foreign intelligence agency, the BND, shares vast quantities of data with their American counterparts, but they insist that they obey the letter of the law.
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German cooperation with the NSA is much closer than first thought. Germany's foreign intelligence agency, the BND, shares vast quantities of data with their American counterparts, but they insist that they obey the letter of the law. Much of the data is likely collected from this facility in Bad Aibling.

Foto: MICHAEL DALDER/ REUTERS
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Excerpts of an NSA document indicating cooperation between the NSA, the BND and the Office for the Protection of the Constitution, Germany's domestic intelligence agency.

Foto: DER SPIEGEL
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Germany's BND is building a new headquarters in Berlin, seen here. The organization also has advanced surveillance software which the Americans praised as being better, in some respects, than the NSA's own XKeyscore.

Foto: Claudia Levetzow/ picture alliance / dpa
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Gerhard Schindler, head of the BND, has followed a more aggressive surveillance path than his predecessors. But he insists that the BND follows the letter of German law.

Foto: Rainer Jensen/ picture alliance / dpa
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NSA chief Keith Alexander. The NSA provided the XKeyscore surveillance software to the Germans and the BND likewise made their software available to the US.

Foto: SPIEGEL ONLINE