The NSA's Project SANTA is entering the 55th year of its sordid and varied history.
The top secret initiative Soviet-Aware Networking and Training Activity was set up within the CIA during the height of the Cold War, in 1953, to gather intelligence on Communist sympathizers in the United States. The original plan was to place covert operatives throughout the US in an effort to induce children to unwittingly spy on their parents. The project was unique from its founding in that several Senators managed to insert into the law establishing the project (Secret Law 1953-22) a restriction that, due to the Project's extreme sensitivity, this data collection could happen only face-to-face (Clause 13(b)). Because it was common in those days for everyone in a neighborhood to know everyone else and because of Clause 13(b), it was decided that a public face on the new operatives was needed, employing the idea of hiding in plain sight. CIA worked through the Coca-Cola Corporation to develop such a public face, based on an old story of Saint Nicholas. The face of Project SANTA is instantly recognizable to any American: the jolly red-suited Santa Claus as seen in their commercials and afterwards in shopping malls throughout America.
The jolly red-suited Santa Claus is required study within those in the know at the Agency as a textbook case of hiding in plain sight. Of course, a jolly operative was required for trust, and therefore for deception. The red suit was conceived as a way to confuse an enemy which already claimed the color red. Following the strategy of hiding in plain sight, the man was named Santa after the project, and Claus as a reference to Clause 13(b) of Secret Law 1953-22. And, finally, the placement of such deeply under cover operatives in such public places is widely considered a stroke of genius.
For decades afterwards, operatives quietly went about their work. Several operatives working jointly were influential in determining the outcome of the Cuban Missile Crisis, among other victories. An unexpected bonus of Project SANTA was the increased recruiting that became available. As the Project grew, Project leaders recognized the opportunity of catching America's children during their formative years and thereby convincing them to join the intelligence community after they are grown. For everyone else, it was simple enough to put out word that "believing in Santa Claus was only for children."
The Project was quick to add new technology as it became available. By giving small gifts to the visiting children that contained various data gathering capabilities, the Project was able to spy on ordinary Americans in their homes. The year 1971 brought a test run of such technology, enabling analysis of sleeping patterns. This enabled the Project to recognize people with jet lag, and therefore people who had recently visited foreign operatives. It was a smashing success, and led to further data gathering. The enormity of the task forced the Project to boil down each subject's data into a single metric focusing on their naughty-to-nice ratio.
The only known mole in the Project was discovered in 1974. John Doe's (the actual name of the mole is still heavily classified) cover was that of an musician. Before he was captured, he sent a coded message to his handlers using the public airwaves in the form of the song "Santa Claus is Coming to Town". In it, he warned of the dangers of Project SANTA, referring to the test run of Santa knowing whether subjects were awake or asleep. Further, he revealed the existence the naughty/nice metric. It is unknown whether his handlers ever properly understood the ramifications of the contents of the song. It is generally accepted, fortunately, that the broad public does not. Therefore, CIA felt it best to support the song, in an effort to turn young children away from Communism (in the form of discouraging "naughtiness").
In 1992, after the fall of the Soviet Union, Congress recognized that Project SANTA was no longer needed. The project would have been completely shut down, except that, by that time, the sight of Santa Clauses in malls and shopping centers had become a fixture of Christmas time. Shutting the project down, therefore, would have revealed CIA's hand in the entire project. So, while the public face of the project continued to recruit new operatives, the back-end data analysis was discontinued.
After 9/11, the complete project was revived, moved to the NSA, and renamed Strategic Awareness of Networks of Terrorist Activity. Due to difference of demographics of Communist sympathizers of yesteryear, and members of terrorist cells, the public mall-dwelling Santa Claus is no longer Project SANTA's primary data gathering methodology. Advances in surveillance technology now allows Project SANTA to determine the naughty/nice quotient of subjects by tapping into their phones, reading their emails, and various other means.
So, remember to be good for goodness's sake.
