The Guardian reports that during a test exercise of direct taps on the fiber-optic cables done by GCHQ in November 2008, " journalists’ communications were among 70,000 emails harvested in the space of less than 10 minutes. . ." While the article notes that there is no indication that journalists were purposefully targeted, it notes that GCHQ captured "[e]mails from the BBC, Reuters, the Guardian, the New York Times, Le Monde, the Sun, NBC and the Washington Post." GCHQ retained the communications where they were accessible to all cleared staff on the agency intranet. The Guardian also indicates that " that a GCHQ information security assessment listed “investigative journalists” as a threat in a hierarchy alongside terrorists or hackers."