The State Agency for National Security (SANS) admitted that there was some discrepancy in the way it had performed an investigation into information leaks from the agency to the media. On October 10 2008 the agency said that it echoed Parliament's committee on public order and internal security in its conclusions that SANS' investigation, dubbed “Gallery”, has veered away from its initial goals.

The Gallery investigation was made public by Bulgarian Socialist Party MP Tatyana Doncheva who said that SANS had checked hers and other MPs' phone records without clear reasoning. Doncheva also said that SANS had about 50 journalists from various media under surveillance in relation to the investigation. Apparently there was a file on each journalist with visuals and a short profile, hence the name “Gallery”.

Now a day after the committee said it was going to ask the General-Prosecutor's Office to check SANS’ work, SANS said that it agreed with the committee that not everything was right with its investigation.

“Information was collected about people, companies and media, which could hardly be referred to the nature of the investigation. The phone records of publishers and journalists have been checked (usually without clear motivation), together with those of Members of Parliament.

With just one exception the investigation did not check SANS' officials in relation to the investigation, who, according to the law, bear responsibility for protecting classified information.

There has not been a regular report on the use of special intelligence methods as the law requires. The Gallery investigation has not been conducted in accordance with SANS' internal regulations and has not fulfilled its original goals,” SANS' statement said.

“Special intelligence methods have been legally used against just one journalist,” it also said.

As a result of the findings SANS decided to limit the authority of Vladimir Pisanchev, head of SANS Security Directorate.