( CNN ) -- Britain 's electronic intelligence agency monitored delegates ' phones and tried to capture their passwords during an economic summit held there in 2009 , the Guardian newspaper reported Sunday . The targets included British allies such as Turkey and South Africa , the newspaper reported . The Guardian cited documents provided by Edward Snowden , the American computer analyst now spilling secrets of the U.S. intelligence community . The latest report was published on the eve of another economic summit hosted by the British government -- the Group of Eight economic summit in Northern Ireland . According to the newspaper , the documents show that the British signals intelligence agency GCHQ used `` ground-breaking intelligence capabilities '' to intercept calls made by members of the larger G-20 conference delegations at meetings in London . Analysts received round-the-clock summaries of calls that were being made , and GCHQ set up Internet cafes for delegates in hopes of intercepting e-mails and capturing keystrokes , the Guardian reported . One briefing slide explained that would give intelligence agencies the ability to read delegates ' e-mails `` before/as they do , '' providing `` sustained intelligence options against them even after conference has finished . '' Bigger threat : Snowden or NSA ? GCHQ is Britain 's equivalent of the National Security Agency , the highly secretive U.S. communications intelligence service . The Guardian reported that the NSA had attempted to eavesdrop on then-Russian President Dmitry Medvedev during the conference as his phone calls passed through satellite links to Moscow and briefed its British counterparts on the effects . Snowden , 29 , worked for the NSA through a private contractor firm until May , when he decamped to Hong Kong . He went public a week ago as the source of articles by the Guardian and The Washington Post , saying the NSA 's efforts posed `` an existential threat to democracy . '' Shawn Turner , a spokesman for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence , said Sunday he was aware of the Guardian 's latest report but declined to comment on it . `` What we should be focused on is how irresponsible and egregious these recent leaks are , '' he told CNN . `` It 's impossible to know exactly how much damage is being done by these disclosures , but they will have an effect on our counterterrorism efforts . '' Snowden 's revelations about the NSA 's collection of millions of records from U.S. telecommunications and technology firms have led to a furious debate within the United States about the scale and scope of surveillance programs that date to the days after the 2001 al Qaeda attacks on New York and Washington . Defenders say the programs -- approved by Congress after a warrantless surveillance effort under the Bush administration was revealed in 2005 -- have protected American lives by helping agents break up terrorism plots . Cheney defends NSA , calls Obama 's credibility 'nonexistent ' Retired Gen. Michael Hayden , a former NSA director , told CNN 's Fareed Zakaria GPS that what the agency collects are `` essentially billing records '' that detail the time , duration and number of a phone call . The records are added to a database that agents can query in cases involving a terror investigation overseas , and agents ca n't eavesdrop on Americans ' calls without an order from a secret court that handles intelligence matters , he said . If a phone number related to that investigation has links to a domestic phone number , `` We 've got to go back to the court , '' he said . But critics such as Sen. Mark Udall , a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee , had raised questions about the scale of the program even before Snowden 's leak . Udall told NBC 's `` Meet the Press '' on Sunday that he does n't believe the program is making Americans any safer , `` and I think it 's ultimately , perhaps , a violation of the Fourth Amendment . '' `` I think we owe it to the American people to have a fulsome debate in the open about the extent of these programs , '' said Udall , D-Colorado . `` You have a law that 's been interpreted secretly by a secret court that then issues secret orders to generate a secret program . I just do n't think this is an American approach to a world in which we have great threats . '' But President Barack Obama does not feel that he has violated the privacy of any American , his chief of staff , Denis McDonough , told CBS ' `` Face the Nation . '' McDonough said the president will discuss the need to `` find the right balance , especially in this new situation where we find ourselves with all of us reliant on Internet , on e-mail , on texting . '' Shortly after the stories broke , Obama publicly defended the NSA programs as `` modest encroachments on privacy '' that help prevent terrorism . CNN 's Jessica Yellin contributed to this report .
Britain tried to spy on G-20 delegates in 2009 , the Guardian reports . The report was published a day before the G-8 summit in Northern Ireland . It 's the latest revelation based on documents from NSA leaker Edward Snowden . Comment: