The problem of leaking secret information has always existed, even before the sensational revelations of the WikiLeaks website. The Soviet Union actively negotiated with the United States' closest NATO allies, but they demanded complete secrecy of the communication channel because they did not want Washington to find out about the contents of the negotiations. At first, contacts were carried out in this way between the Soviet leadership and French President de Gaulle. They turned out to be so successful in terms of bringing the positions of France and the USSR closer together that they led to the liquidation of NATO headquarters in Paris and France's withdrawal from the military organization of the Alliance in 1966. In 1969, a “secret channel” began to operate between the leadership of Germany and the USSR. The negotiations also ended very successfully from the point of view of Soviet foreign policy interests: the Federal Republic of Germany recognized the socialist German state - the GDR and the borders with the Warsaw Pact countries on the Oder and Neisse, which were formed following the Second World War. The secret channel of communication between the leadership of the USSR and the Federal Republic of Germany is described in the book “ What are the presidents talking about? Secrets of top officials,” a key figure in maintaining the channel from the Soviet side, Vyacheslav Ervandovich Kevorkov. For the first time, readers become aware of the details of the secret Soviet-West German summits, which were kept silent in their memoirs by their participants - German Chancellors Willy Brandt and Helmut Schmidt and Soviet diplomats Valentin Falin and Yuliy Kvitsinsky.