Romantic NSA Agents Used Their Power to Spy on Their Crushes

Apparently, being an NSA agent pays off for your love life as well.

Just as we imagined everyone kind of expected, a few NSA agents have used their spying techniques to spy on their love interests, U.S. officials are saying; and they even had a name for it: "LOVEINT" for love intelligence. Though it didn't happen very often (at least accounting for the people who were caught), but the times it did happen, it usually involved overseas relationships. The occurrences happened with about one agent a year, for the past decade. When the agents were brought in for a periodic polygraph test, they would confess to spying on a partner or spouse after an inconsistency popped up. Then, they were either punished or terminated from their position. Ouch.

"Clearly, any case of noncompliance is unacceptable," said Sen. Dianne Feinstein of Calif., who is the chair of the Senate intelligence committee. "But these small numbers of cases do not change my view that NSA takes significant care to prevent any abuses and that there is a substantial oversight system in place."

"When errors are identified, they are reported and corrected."

Don't get any bright ideas about playing spy on your girl now. Trust is always key, so spare yourself from reaching for her phone when it lights up. 

Also, this is on top of news that the NSA bugged the United Nations offices in NYC. The UN! They know no limits. 

[via Wall Street Journal]