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French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius says the claims are "totally unacceptable"
French President Francois Hollande has expressed "deep disapproval" over claims the US National Security Agency secretly tapped phone calls in France.
In a phone conversation with US President Barack Obama, he said this was "unacceptable between friends and allies", demanding an explanation.
The White House said the claims "raise legitimate questions", seeking to ease French concerns.
The NSA has recently spied on 70.3m phone calls in France, it is claimed.
Officials, businesses and terror suspects are believed to have been tracked in just 30 days between 10 December last year and 8 January 2013.
The allegations were carried in France's Le Monde newspaper and are based on leaks from US ex-intelligence analyst Edward Snowden.
'Challenging task'
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John Kerry talked about "protecting the security of our citizens"
The claims prompted President Obama to call his French counterpart to discuss the issue on Monday.
Mr Hollande said that such practices "infringe on the privacy of French citizens" and demanded "explanations" from Mr Obama, according to a statement issued by French presidency.
A White House statement said the two presidents had discussed the latest disclosure, "some of which have distorted our activities and some of which raise legitimate questions for our friends and allies about how these capabilities are employed".
It said: "President [Obama] made clear that the United States has begun to review the way that we gather intelligence, so that we properly balance the legitimate security concerns of our citizens and allies with the privacy concerns that all people share."
Meanwhile, US Secretary of State John Kerry said Washington would continue "bilateral consultations" to address the issue, describing France as "one of our oldest allies".
Analysis
This is not the first time the US has been accused of spying on the French. Last year the Elysee Palace confirmed it had discovered a "powerful worm" in the computers of the Elysee network that had the ability to collect files on a machine, take screenshots, even activate the microphone on a computer to record conversations.
The US embassy in Paris categorically denied the US had been involved in any cyber attack on the French government. Nonetheless the finger was pointed by the French media.
On Monday morning, Laurent Fabius summoned the US ambassador to an urgent meeting to request an explanation of these latest allegations from Le Monde. But then, the French already know the power of these surveillance programmes - because according to Le Monde they've been running a similar surveillance programme themselves; though perhaps only focused on its own nationals.
"Protecting the security of our citizens in today's world is a very complicated, very challenging task... because there are lots of people out there seeking to do harm to other people," Mr Kerry said.
In an earlier statement, National Security Council spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden said that "all nations" conducted spying operations.
"As a matter of policy we have made clear that the United States gathers foreign intelligence of the type gathered by all nations," she said.
Envoy summoned
Le Monde says the NSA intercepts were apparently triggered by certain key words.
The agency also apparently captured millions of text messages.
It was unclear whether the content of the calls and messages was stored, or just the metadata - the details of who was speaking to whom.
And the paper did not say whether the operation, codenamed US-985D, was still in progress.
France's foreign ministry summoned US ambassador Charles Rivkin over the allegations.
US allies on spying claims
US agencies accused of spying on leaders of Brazil and Mexico; Brazil's Dilma Rousseff cancels state visit, Mexico's Enrique Pena Nieto says US has promised an inquiry
US allegedly runs bugging operations on EU mission in Washington and other European embassies; France objects, Germany cancels surveillance agreement with US and UK
Le Monde claims NSA snooped on millions of phone calls in France; US ambassador in Paris summoned to explain
The BBC's Christian Fraser in Paris says the outrage is largely for public consumption, because the French government has been accused of running its own snooping operation similar to the US.
Le Monde reported in July that the French government was storing vast amounts of personal data of its citizens on a supercomputer at the headquarters of the DGSE intelligence service.
The latest revelations follow claims in the German media that US agents hacked into the email account of former Mexican President Felipe Calderon.
Mr Snowden, a former NSA worker, went public with revelations about US spying operations in June.
The information he leaked led to claims of systematic spying by the NSA and CIA on a global scale.
Targets included rivals like China and Russia, as well as allies like the EU and Brazil.
The NSA was also forced to admit it had captured email and phone data from millions of Americans.
Mr Snowden is currently in Russia, where he was granted a year-long visa after making an asylum application.
The US wants him extradited to face trial on criminal charges.
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