Unit 8200 is an Israeli Defence Force (IDF) Intelligence Corps unit, responsible for collecting signal intelligence and code decryption. It is the largest unit in the IDF, with several thousand soldiers. It is comparable in its function to the United States’ National Security Agency, except that it is not a separate civilian body.
In March 2004, The Commission to investigate the intelligence network following the War in Iraq recommended turning the unit into a civilian National SIGINT Agency, as is largely the case in other Western countries, but this proposal has yet to be implemented. Urim SIGINT Base is the most important signal intelligence-gathering installation operated by Israel’s military and is part of Unit 8200. The Urim base is located in the Negev desert approximately 30km from Beersheba.
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