Finland Times

Meanwhile, an official from the governmental control authority noted that Finland could not control the communication lines outside Finland anyhow.

A joint investigation by German media houses NDR, WDR, Suddeutsche Zeitung and the British Channel 4 based on documents leaked by whistleblower Edward Snowden, claimed to reveal how the UK telecom firm Cable & Wireless played a key role in establishing one of the surveillance programs under the Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ).

Finland and Sweden were mentioned in the quotes of one of the sources.

Mikko Hypponen, the research director of the Finnish internet security company F-Secure, told the national broadcaster Yle on Thursday that it seemed to be "business as usual" that British intelligence monitors European internet communications.

Hypponen described such a situation as "amazing" with a view to the fact that "Britain is a member of the European Union."

Hypponen recalled that British paper The Guardian reported a year ago that the GCHQ had been monitoring the cables connecting service centres of Google located in Dublin, Ireland, and Hamina, Finland.

The Guardian claimed at the time that the British had been able to enter the connections between Hamina and Dublin.

Ari Karppanen, a leading expert at the Finnish Communications Regulatory Authority (FICORA), told Yle that British access could not be dismissed.

He underlined that Finnish officials had no powers to mind networks outside Finland. The authority does instruct Finnish operators on protection.

Hypponen said that perhaps the British had such access, but he could not confirm it. He believed the documents revealed by the German media were real, however.

"But being technically able to do it is a different matter from actually having done it," Hypponen noted.