GCHQ

Not to be confused with HM Government Communications Centre or Conservative Campaign Headquarters.

Government Communications Headquarters

The Doughnut from above in 2017
Agency overview
Formed1 November 1919; 105 years ago (1919-11-01) (as Government Code and Cypher School)
Preceding agencies
JurisdictionHis Majesty's Government
HeadquartersThe Doughnut
Hubble Road
Cheltenham, England
United Kingdom
51°53′58″N 2°07′28″W / 51.89944°N 2.12444°W / 51.89944; -2.12444
Employees7,181[1]
Annual budgetSingle Intelligence Account (£3.711 billion in 2021–2022)[1]
Minister responsible
Agency executive
Child agencies
Websitewww.gchq.gov.uk Edit this at Wikidata
Footnotes

Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) is an intelligence and security organisation responsible for providing signals intelligence (SIGINT) and information assurance (IA) to the government and armed forces of the United Kingdom.[2] Primarily based at "The Doughnut" in the suburbs of Cheltenham, GCHQ is the responsibility of the country's Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Foreign Secretary), but it is not a part of the Foreign Office and its director ranks as a Permanent Secretary.

GCHQ was originally established after the First World War as the Government Code and Cypher School (GC&CS)[3] and was known under that name until 1946. During the Second World War it was located at Bletchley Park, where it was responsible for breaking the German Enigma codes. There are two main components of GCHQ, the Composite Signals Organisation (CSO), which is responsible for gathering information, and the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), which is responsible for securing the UK's own communications. The Joint Technical Language Service (JTLS) is a small department and cross-government resource responsible for mainly technical language support and translation and interpreting services across government departments. It is co-located with GCHQ for administrative purposes.

In 2013, GCHQ received considerable media attention when the former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden revealed that the agency was in the process of collecting all online and telephone data in the UK via the Tempora programme.[4] Snowden's revelations began a spate of ongoing disclosures of global surveillance. The Guardian newspaper was forced to destroy computer hard drives with the files Snowden had given them because of the threats of a lawsuit under the Official Secrets Act.[5] In June 2014, The Register reported that the information the government sought to suppress by destroying the hard drives related to the location of a "beyond top secret" GCHQ internet monitoring base in Seeb, Oman, and the close involvement of BT and Cable & Wireless in intercepting internet communications.[6]

  1. ^ a b "Intelligence and Security Committee of Parliament "Annual Report 2021–2022"" (PDF). Archived (PDF) from the original on 23 December 2022. Retrieved 20 December 2022.
  2. ^ GCHQ – Welcome to GCHQ Archived 22 October 2014 at the Wayback Machine, Government of the United Kingdom. Retrieved 7 July 2014.
  3. ^ Headrick, Daniel R. (1991) The invisible Weapon: Telecommunications and International Politics 1851-1945, Oxford UP p219
  4. ^ "A simple guide to GCHQ's internet surveillance programme Tempora". Wired UK. 24 June 2013. Archived from the original on 15 May 2016. Retrieved 29 August 2017.
  5. ^ Borger, Julian (21 August 2013). "NSA files: why the Guardian in London destroyed hard drives of leaked files". The Guardian. Archived from the original on 4 February 2017. Retrieved 27 May 2018.
  6. ^ Campbell, Duncan (3 June 2014). "Revealed: GCHQ's beyond top secret middle eastern internet spy base". The Register. Archived from the original on 25 June 2014. Retrieved 16 September 2017.