The National Security Agency and telecommunications giant AT&T Inc. have been involved in a spying program that has spanned several years, according to a new investigation outlined Monday by The Intercept.

The investigation revealed that eight AT&T facilities in the cities of Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, New York City, San Francisco, Seattle and Washington, D.C. have been used by the NSA as part of a program called “Fairview.”

These buildings reportedly are “central to an NSA spying initiative that has for years monitored billions of emails, phone calls and online chats passing across U.S. territory.” This follows a report last year in which The Intercept said it was likely the NSA had a facility in an AT&T building in Lower Manhattan, New York City.

The most important surveillance story you will see for years just went online, revealing how @ATT became the internet’s biggest enemy, secretly collaborating against its customers and partners to destroy your privacy. https://t.co/nUGPjFSYh5

— Edward Snowden (@Snowden) June 25, 2018

The report comes at a time of fragility regarding the American public and government surveillance. This is largely a result of a massive Facebook data leak and also Amazon.com Inc.’s facial recognition technology being sold to law enforcement agencies, but the growing concern is if you are using any kind of digital device, you are likely being monitored by someone.

Public pressure does seem to have some effect, however. The Orlando Police Department announced Monday that it has ended its project with Amazon to use the company’s “Rekognition” face recognition software.

The Intercept wrote that the monitored traffic doesn’t include only ATT&T’s own customers. That’s because of  “peering,” which involves telecommunications providers in the U.S. and abroad selling or exchanging bandwidth when another company is overburdened with data. AT&T is frequently used as a peer.

The data is routed “through the eight AT&T buildings, where the NSA taps into it,” Mark Klein told The Intercept. Klein had been a technician at the company for 22 years.

It’s these eight facilities that are some of ATT&T’s biggest among its global network, nexuses of vast amounts of digital information which according to documents are highly valued by the NSA. According to the report, because so much international data moves through these servers, the NSA likes to say it has “home field advantage.”

“Like all companies, we are required by law to provide information to government and law enforcement entities by complying with court orders, subpoenas, lawful discovery requests and other legal requirements,” Jim Greer, the director of corporate communication at AT&T, said in a statement. He added that voluntary assistance will be given to government agencies in situations such as when someone’s life is in danger, but only when requests are in compliance with the law.

Image: Claudia M Eastman via Flickr