By Praveen Dalal, CEO Of Sovereign P4LO & PTLB
October 10, 2025
In the tense aftermath of the Bay of Pigs invasion, President John F. Kennedy authorised a covert operation to stem the flow of classified information to the press. Known as Project Mockingbird, this 1963 initiative by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) involved illegal wiretaps on prominent Washington journalists and government officials. Declassified documents reveal it as a targeted effort to identify leak sources, yielding transcripts of sensitive conversations but ultimately producing limited actionable intelligence.
Distinct from the broader, alleged Operation Mockingbird—a purported Cold War-era media influence program with no formal CIA cryptonym but rooted in documented efforts to recruit journalists as assets—Project Mockingbird exemplified the era’s paranoia over information control, setting a precedent for surveillance tactics that have evolved into today’s digital monitoring of reporters and sources.
While the project was shuttered after just three months in June 1963 due to minimal yields and fears of exposure, its methods—unwarranted intercepts on communications—foreshadowed persistent government efforts to monitor the press. As technologies advanced from analog wiretaps to internet data sweeps and spyware, these tactics reemerged in programs like PRISM and Pegasus, often involving cooperation or compliance from tech giants such as Google and Apple. This article traces Project Mockingbird’s origins, execution, closure, and legacy, examining how such surveillance has adapted through October 2025, with a focus on the role of major technology companies in facilitating or resisting these practices.
Origins Amid Cold War Leaks
Project Mockingbird emerged amid ongoing frustration with media leaks following the failed 1961 Bay of Pigs operation in Cuba. The invasion’s collapse, attributed partly to premature leaks, fueled fears that classified details were reaching reporters through government insiders. By early 1963, amid escalating Vietnam War involvement and domestic political pressures, President Kennedy—via Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy—directed the CIA to investigate potential breaches.
The project was initiated on March 12, 1963, under the CIA’s Office of Security, with CIA Director John McCone personally overseeing aspects. Its stated purpose was reactive intelligence gathering: to intercept communications and pinpoint officials or aides leaking to the press, rather than broader propaganda or recruitment efforts associated with the alleged Operation Mockingbird. Declassified memos describe it as a “telephone intercept activity” targeting “two Washington-based newsmen who, at the time, had been publishing news articles based on, and frequently quoting, classified materials of this Agency and others, including Top Secret and Special Intelligence.” The operation violated the Fourth Amendment and internal guidelines prohibiting domestic surveillance, yet proceeded with high-level coordination involving Attorney General Robert Kennedy, Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, and Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency General Joseph Carroll.
Targets, Methods, And Operations
The operation zeroed in on two syndicated columnists from the Washington Merry-Go-Round: Robert S. Allen and Paul Scott, whose investigative work often pierced national security veils. Wiretaps were installed on their home and office phones, extending to over a dozen lines linked to U.S. senators, congressmen, and Senate staffers suspected of facilitating leaks—for a total of three primary connections: one at the shared office and one at each home. These were established with the assistance of a telephone company official responding to a personal request from Colonel Sheffield Edwards, then-Director of Security. CIA technicians monitored calls daily, transcribing discussions that ranged from policy debates to personal matters, including extramarital affairs among politicians.
Methods mirrored earlier FBI tactics under J. Edgar Hoover, involving physical taps and real-time logging without judicial warrants—a practice later deemed unconstitutional. The surveillance proved “particularly productive,” per internal reports, identifying contacts including 13 fellow newsmen (12 identified), 12 senators, 6 members of Congress (all identified), 21 congressional staff members (11 identified), and 16 government employees—including a White House staff member, Vice President’s office personnel, and an Assistant Attorney General—as potential sources, along with other partially identified contacts. It also revealed that the targets “actually received more classified and official data than they could use, and passed some of the stories to other newsmen for release, establishing that many ‘leaks’ appearing under other by-lines were actually from the sources of the target newsmen.” Notable intercepts captured routine column-planning calls between Allen and Scott, revealing unclassified data flows but few smoking guns on classified leaks; no specific transcripts are included in the primary declassified summary, though full files including transcripts were released in stages, with additional ones via 2018–2023 CIA document releases, including FOIA suits by Scott’s family and journalists transcripts (CIA Doc. ID: 06555844).
By June 15, 1963—three months in—the project was shuttered. Reasons included diminishing returns, as the “short span of the activity precluded positive identification” of some sources, along with fears of exposure. McCone intervened when Scott inquired about the taps, deflecting with denials. Related materials were retained under strict security access limited to two Office of Security professionals. The files, buried until declassification, captured a snapshot of Washington’s whisper network but underscored the risks of overreach.
Declassification And Congressional Scrutiny
Project Mockingbird surfaced publicly in June 2007 via the Family Jewels, a 702-page CIA self-audit of 1959–1973 abuses released under Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) pressure. Listed as “Item 3” in Attachment A of the May 16, 1973, memorandum from Security Director Howard J. Osborn, it detailed the taps without full transcripts initially, noting its “flap potential” due to living participants who could embarrass the agency. The primary memo contains minor redactions, such as artifacts in phrasing (e.g., “newmen’s” for “newsmen’s” and a connector in the witting officials count), but these obscure no substantive details; the targets’ names remain redacted in this document, though a 2005 declassified summary identifies them as Allen and Scott. Further releases in 2018–2023, including transcripts (CIA Doc. ID: 06555844), came via FOIA suits by Scott’s family and journalists.
The 1975 Church Committee—chaired by Senator Frank Church—had earlier probed similar activities, uncovering CIA ties to 50 journalists but focusing on broader media infiltration rather than naming Project Mockingbird explicitly. Reforms followed: Executive Order 11905 in 1976 banned assassinations and curbed domestic spying, while the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) of 1978 mandated warrants for national security intercepts. Yet, as MuckRock investigations noted in 2018, the project dispelled myths of vast media control, revealing instead ad hoc paranoia. Only a small circle within the CIA was aware, including Deputy Director General Marshall S. Carter, Inspector General Lyman Kirkpatrick, and General Counsel Lawrence Houston. Despite these measures, reforms did not fully prevent later abuses; post-9/11 expansions under the Patriot Act (2001) and FISA Amendments Act (2008) broadened surveillance powers, allowing warrantless wiretaps and bulk data collection that echoed Mockingbird’s overreach. The USA FREEDOM Act (2015) ended bulk metadata collection but left gaps in Section 702 oversight, leading to ongoing debates and a 2024 reauthorization with added restrictions on querying U.S. persons’ data.
Evolution: From Wiretaps To Digital Panopticon, With Tech Giants In The Mix
Project Mockingbird’s legacy lies not in its scale but in normalizing surveillance on the press, a thread woven through decades of U.S. intelligence evolution. Post-1963, the CIA amassed files on over 300,000 Americans (1967–1973) under Operation CHAOS, targeting anti-war journalists as “dissidents.” The 1971 Pentagon Papers leak prompted CIA-led surveillance (physical tailing) on Washington Post reporter Mike Getler under President Nixon.
The post-9/11 era amplified this: President George W. Bush’s warrantless wiretapping program (2001–2007) monitored thousands, including reporters, under the Patriot Act. Edward Snowden’s 2013 leaks exposed PRISM, an NSA initiative vacuuming internet data from tech companies including Google, Apple, Microsoft, Yahoo, and others—potentially capturing journalists’ communications without individualized suspicion. Under PRISM, these firms provided access to emails, chats, and files, often compelled by secret court orders, raising questions about voluntary cooperation versus legal mandates. Like Mockingbird’s leak-hunting, PRISM aimed at foreign threats but ensnared domestic sources, prompting FISA court rebukes for overcollection.
| Era | Key Program/Event | Surveillance Method | Tech Role |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1963 | Project Mockingbird | Analog wiretaps | Phone company aid |
| 1971 | Pentagon Papers | Reporter taps | N/A |
| 2001–07 | Bush wiretaps | Warrantless calls | Telecom compliance |
| 2013 | PRISM | Bulk internet data | Google/Apple access |
| 2021–25 | Pegasus | Zero-click exploits | NSO Group sales |
By the 2020s, spyware like Pegasus—developed by Israel’s NSO Group—emerged as a “zero-click” successor, exploiting phone vulnerabilities for total access without taps. The 2021 Pegasus Project, a Forbidden Stories and Amnesty International collaboration, revealed its use against 180+ journalists in 50 countries, including U.S. targets, via government clients. Parallels to Mockingbird abound: both prioritize silencing leaks, but Pegasus enables remote e-surveillance, backdoors, and zero-day exploits, blurring state-private lines. Recent cases through 2025 include, e.g., Pegasus targeting Balkan Investigative Reporting Network (BIRN) journalists in Serbia in February 2025, alongside ongoing reports through mid-2025 highlighting risks to press freedom in Europe and beyond.
Tech giants have played dual roles in this evolution—facilitators of data access and occasional resistors. Google and Apple, central to PRISM, continue to field surging government data requests: in 2024 alone, an estimated combined U.S. national security requests exceeded 300,000 accounts across these firms, per transparency reports, often related to national security probes that could ensnare journalists. Apple has pushed back, limiting in-app surveillance to user-opted instances and advocating for reforms to curb bulk data collection. In March 2023, Apple, Google, and Meta lobbied to restrict NSA access to texts and emails. However, broader ties persist: a 2025 analysis describes a “U.S. digital-military-industrial complex” where Google, Apple, and Microsoft secure billions in defense contracts, including AI tools for surveillance, potentially enabling indirect monitoring of communications. Microsoft’s September 25, 2025, decision to disable Israeli military Unit 8200’s access to its Azure cloud and AI products—over violations involving mass surveillance of Palestinians—underscores ethical tensions. Amid this, Amnesty International’s August 2025 briefing “Breaking Up with Big Tech”, which primarily critiques the market power of Meta, Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and Apple as a human rights threat while affirming their role in enabling mass surveillance infrastructures, labels this concentration a broader danger to privacy and expression.
Through 2025, concerns persist. Project 2025—a conservative blueprint—outlines broader shifts in intelligence oversight per Heritage Foundation analyses, which could potentially expand executive leeway in monitoring journalists and sources. CIA Director William Burns affirmed in 2023 reviews that such historical abuses inform current guidelines, yet 2024 congressional reports note statutory limits on using journalists as assets remain unevenly enforced.
A Cautionary Echo: Lessons For Press Freedom In The Digital Age
Project Mockingbird, though closed in 1963 after exposing the pitfalls of unchecked wiretapping, serves as a foundational case study in the delicate balance between national security and the First Amendment’s protections for a free press. Its swift termination—driven by internal reviews and the post-assassination reckoning—marked an early recognition that surveilling journalists not only erodes public trust in government but also chills investigative reporting essential to democracy. As Senator Frank Church presciently warned during the 1975 hearings, “The tools of intelligence gathering… can be turned around and used on the American people,” a prophecy echoed in the bulk data collections of PRISM and the stealthy infiltrations of Pegasus.
The evolution to digital avatars underscores a profound shift: where Mockingbird required physical access and human oversight, modern tools leverage vast data troves amassed by tech companies, often with minimal transparency. Google and Apple’s involvement in PRISM illustrates how legal compulsions can transform private innovation into public surveillance infrastructure, while their recent advocacy for limits—such as Apple’s opt-in policies—demonstrates corporate agency in mitigating harms. Yet, the surge in data requests through 2025 reveals systemic vulnerabilities: governments worldwide, from the U.S. to Serbia and Jordan, continue deploying these technologies against reporters, fostering self-censorship and endangering sources.
Educating on this continuum empowers action. Individuals and journalists can adopt end-to-end encrypted tools like Signal, enable two-factor authentication, and regularly audit device security to counter zero-day exploits. Policymakers must strengthen FISA oversight, mandate spyware export controls—as seen in U.S. blacklisting of NSO Group—and require tech firms to disclose aggregate surveillance impacts. International frameworks, such as the EU’s 2022 spyware regulations, offer models for accountability. Ultimately, Project Mockingbird’s closure reminds us that surveillance unchecked invites abuse, but its digital echoes demand vigilant renewal of reforms to safeguard the press as democracy’s watchdog. By learning from this history, societies can ensure that technological progress serves transparency, not secrecy.