Power corrupts.
The NSA is building a facility in Colorado that will have the memory capacity to store NOW 100 years of every bit of data currently produced in our entire world. I'm talking content of communications and not just numbers. Every email, text, phone conversation, etc.
The estimated power of those computing resources in Utah is so massive it requires use of a little-known unit of storage space: the zettabyte. Cisco quantifies a zettabyte as the amount of data that would fill 250 billion DVDs.The NSA's Utah Data Center will be able to handle and process five zettabytes of data, according to William Binney, a former NSA technical director turned whistleblower. Binney's calculation is an estimate. An NSA spokeswoman says the actual data capacity of the center is classified.
"They would have plenty of space with five zettabytes to store at least something on the order of 100 years worth of the worldwide communications, phones and emails and stuff like that," Binney asserts, "and then have plenty of space left over to do any kind of parallel processing to try to break codes." http://www.npr.org/2013/06/10/190160772/amid-data-controversy-nsa-builds-its-biggest-data-farm
Why do they need that capacity if they aren't planning on using it?
A Much longer vid with Mike Hayden Because if you don’t really understand what the program/s are how can you criticize it?
Inside the NSA: An Evening with General Michael Hayden
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ESGBPmf0mc
Oct 28, 2014
After the attacks, at the request of the White House, Hayden intensified and expanded NSA wiretapping operations of various communications between Americans and terrorist suspects abroad in hopes of detecting and preventing another terrorist attack. These initial efforts were executed without a court order and after being revealed by The New York Times, were subsequently placed under judicial review. Over time, the NSA’s efforts grew into the multidimensional programs exposed by Edward Snowden, including the collection and storage of phone and email metadata covering billions of calls and messages between American citizens.
In conversation with Amy Zegart, General Hayden provides an insider’s account about the origins and development of the NSA programs. He discusses the directives and mechanisms to control them, and the disagreements within the Bush administration about the extent of the wiretapping. He offers his views on the justification, legal status, scale, and effectiveness of the NSA monitoring.
I don’t believe them. The IRS isn’t supposed to use their records for political purposes. They did. They’re not supposed to target political opponents of an administration. They did.
Power corrupts.
A couple of points
1. The NAS & The IRS are 2 different agencies. They have two different jobs, recruit from 2 different pools, have different agency cultures. Once you get past the fact they are both part of the executive branch of the federal government very little in common.
2. Yes power corrupts. Now here’s the thing, EVERY law/regulation..etc can be misused...abused, everything from local zoning laws to the NAS metadata program. So what we are doing is having a national debate about where that line is. So there are 2 small simple questions (Pat. Pend. :-)) we have to ask, What Do You Want? And Then What Happens? In order to have a rational reasonable discussion we have to know just what the the NSA is doing...ie collecting your/my Phone Bill.
Now it is understandable the concerns being expressed over this. (NEWS FLASH) The federal government is to big, to intrusive! So it is always a good idea to keep an eye on the SOB’s, but (for me and others) your Phone Bill being collected and stored is not a major worry.
As for NSA’s Utah Data Center, all that information is already being gathered are held already....your bank..ISP...credit card company...your employer...etc...etc. Can this be abused? Well Hello! Anything can be misused.
Welcome to the XXIst century.
If we have another mass casualty attack and it is found out terrorist were communicating over Telephone/E-Mails many of the same people who are screaming about this today, will be screaming for heads to roll at NSA.