History UsefulNotes / NSA

[[caption-width-right:200:In God We Trust. [[ParanoiaFuel All others we monitor.]]]]

Before the NSA proper was The Black Chamber, so called in part because of the book about it. It was established in UsefulNotes/WorldWarI and had a cover as a civilian coding agency. During TheTwenties, funding was pulled because the secretary of state considered decryption to be unfair. Denied funding, the head of it wrote a book about it and tried to keep it open.

Before the NSA proper was The Black Chamber, so called in part because of the book about it. It was established in UsefulNotes/WorldWarI and had a cover as a civilian coding agency. During the 20's funding was pulled because the secretary of state considered decryption to be unfair. Denied funding, the head of it wrote a book about it and tried to keep it open.

* Much of the action in Creator/DanBrown's first novel ''Literature/DigitalFortress'' takes place in the NSA. Like most Dan Brown novels, he blends fiction and reality ([[DanBrowned though he claims not to]]) in his depiction of the agency.

* The agency appears or is referenced in several ''Literature/JackRyan'' novels, particularly ''Literature/SumOfAllFears'', where their communications network's security becomes a plot point. However, they rarely actually do much of anything in the books: CIA apparently handles signals and human intelligence gathering instead, leaving the NSA tasked only with communications integrity (and failing at that!).

[[folder:Live Action TV]]
* In the 1968 ''Series/StarTrekTheOriginalSeries'' episode "Assignment: Earth", Agent Gary Seven has an ID card from the NSA.

* In the fourth episode of ''Series/TheXFiles'', titled "Conduit," NSA Agents break into Mulder's hotel room.

* In the first season of ''Series/{{Dollhouse}}'', [[spoiler: Dominic]] is revealed to be an NSA agent. Several Actives are also imprinted as NSA agents in the episode "Echoes", and one is sent to infiltrate the NSA in "A Spy in the House of Love."

* In season three of ''Series/{{Alias}}'', Vaughn's wife Lauren Reed is an NSA agent. Naturally, she's [[spoiler: a FemmeFataleSpy working for the Alliance]].

* Third Echelon from ''VideoGame/SplinterCell'' is actually a sub-division of the NSA and there is some AllThereInTheManual handwaving about why the eponymous operatives like Sam are employed[[note]]Basically boiling down to "Some things are so secret we can't even let the CIA know, and sometimes you need to get the information directly from the source". In fact, the first game has you ''breaking in'' to CIA headquarters at Langley to get to a source[[/note]].

* The NSA is a relatively minor faction in ''VideoGame/AlphaProtocol'', they have no field agents but you can bug one of their listening posts during the course of the game[[note]]The listening post IS, however, in Rome, which the NSA would likely ''not'' be running: they would leave setting up the listening post to the CIA[[/note]]. Ironically, this makes the NSA, which really ''doesn't'' have any field agents, the most realistically represented intelligence agency in the game. Mina Tang, your MissionControl, is ex-NSA recruited by Alpha Protocol. [[spoiler:She's also TheMole and heavily implied to still be loyal to the NSA, using her position to feed them info on Alpha Protocol.]]

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[[folder:WesternAnimation]]

* In the third episode of ''Series/TheXFiles'', titled "Conduit," NSA Agents break into Mulder's hotel room.

* In the first season of ''Series/{{Dollhouse}}'', [[spoiler: Dominic]] is revealed to be an NSA agent.

By law, NSA's intelligence gathering is limited to foreign communications, although there have been numerous reports that the agency does not always abide by these laws. UsefulNotes/GeorgeWBush famously removed most of the limits on the NSA, even though it was illegal. Some, but not all, of this illegal activity was made legal after the fact when he pushed Congress to modify the laws. Another form of LoopholeAbuse the NSA found was to get help through the "Five Eyes" (or FVEY) alliance, formed by the US's closest allies of the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, and New Zeland - as well their NSA counterparts[[note]]GCHQ, CSE, ASD, and GCSB respectively[[/note]]; since most of them have the same domestic restrictions, they allow the other countries to spy on their citizens and then share the intelligence they found on the target, this means the NSA will spy on British citizens and give what they found to the GHQC, while the GCHQ will spy on American citizens and give the intel to the NSA.

By law, NSA's intelligence gathering is limited to foreign communications, although there have been numerous reports that the agency does not always abide by these laws. UsefulNotes/GeorgeWBush famously removed most of the limits on the NSA, even though it was illegal. Some, but not all, of this illegal activity was made legal after the fact when he pushed Congress to modify the laws. The 2013 PRISM scandal showed this activity has carried on well after Bush left office and doesn't look to be changing any time soon.