The documents also show that the intelligence agency targets large credit card companies, such as the US company, Visa. At an internal conference in 2010, for instance, NSA analysts provided an extensive and detailed description of how they searched for possible points of access in the complex network that Visa uses to process its transactions — and were allegedly successful in penetrating the company’s network. The XKeyscore spying program is used to skim regional data from the Visa network, according to a document.

The agency’s snooping efforts now focus on more than one provider. According to another document, transaction data from a wide range of credit card companies flows into the NSA financial database Tracfin. This allegedly includes data from payment authorization processes by Visa and MasterCard. All in all, “credit card data” and related text messages made up 84 percent of the datasets within Tracfin in September 2011.

According to the presentation, the NSA was previously only able to decrypt payment transactions by bank customers, but now they have access to the internal encrypted communication of the company’s branch offices. This “provides a new stream of financial data and potentially encrypted internal communications” from the financial service provider…”

According to one document, the agency had access to data from Western Union, a company that manages money transfers in over 200 countries, for quite some time. But in 2008 Western Union began to protect its data with high-grade encryption. This made access virtually impossible, as NSA staff members complain in one paper.

( Der Spiegel)

“””Thus says The Lord to the United States: Your nation is given up; behold, the mighty nation is cast down! It has fallen on its side, and who is able to deliver them?! For all who remain shall fall! They shall fall hard, and they shall break!… Behold, they shall be broken in pieces without hand! They shall be stricken and brought very low! Says The Lord in His judgment.
Behold, My anger burns hot and My fury has come up into My face, because of you, O mighty nation! Says The Lord, yes I, The High and Lofty One. For He who holds the key of David has spoken to you, yet you would not listen, indeed you have refused to hear, nor have you walked in The Way of The Lord; your ears are full of pollution and your eyes are covered with violence… You are as a cake unturned, milk gone sour, honey which has altogether lost its flavor, a wayward people who wallow in their own filth, a most backward people! You lay snares at the feet of all who seek to do good, while persecuting those who stand up for what is right!… A most wicked and slothful generation!

Therefore, thus says The Lord: I shall make you as stubble fully dried; and behold, in the midst of you I shall kindle a fire! Upon you shall I bring distress and tribulation! For the whole land shall be as a woman caught in the midst of great travail; like a man overcome with madness, shouting and foaming at the mouth! The land shall convulse and your glory shall be thrown down, your loftiness bowed down, in the day I trample you underfoot! Says The Lord.
City by city shall be broken down, and the blood of the wicked shall be poured upon the ground! For as lightning sets the tree ablaze and boisterous winds drive the flames, so shall I consume you from off this land, from one end to the other!… With blackness and death, with desolation and great distress, until there is no place!
Behold, I shall wear you out, O mighty nation! Calamity upon calamity shall batter you and break you down! Your enemies shall persecute you, without respite, and breach the wall! For you have not ceased from doing evil before My face!… Behold, day and night the innocent are murdered because of YOU!

Thus My hand is stretched out against you, O nation not desired!
FOR YOU HAVE SINNED AGAINST THE LORD!…

Behold, I shall set you forth as an example,
A sign to all nations, a warning for all those who forget God!…

And it shall come to pass, that all who look
Upon you shall be greatly astonished;
They shall hide their faces and draw back from you,
Because of the terror of The Lord! “””