It is a major national security issue to any country to have foreign countries spying on them. The only controversy in the US is that the NSA is spying on American citizens in America. Any and all communication by foreigners at home and abroad is fair game. There is a reason why Google & Facebook are not market leaders in either China & Russia -- vkontakte, baidu, yandex, etc.

Likewise, this is also very bad news if you are a Chinese or Russian internet company and expect to become a dominant player in the US consumer web/digital/mobile market place.