NSA Drowns In Useless Data, Impeding Work, Former Employee Claims 120
An anonymous reader writes in with this story of confusion at the NSA due to the flood of data they harvest. "Some of the documents released by Mr. Snowden detail concerns inside the NSA about drowning in information. An internal briefing document in 2012 about foreign cellphone-location tracking by the agency said the efforts were 'outpacing our ability to ingest, process and store' data. In March 2013, some NSA analysts asked for permission to collect less data through a program called Muscular because the 'relatively small intelligence value it contains does not justify the sheer volume of collection,' another document shows. In response to questions about Mr. Binney's claims, an NSA spokeswoman says the agency is 'not collecting everything, but we do need the tools to collect intelligence on foreign adversaries who wish to do harm to the nation and its allies.'"
Be friendlier to foreigners .... (Score:2, Interesting)
An easier solution .... treat foreigners as you would have them treat yourself or your compatriots. Apply the same standards of "justice" that you would meet out on your own citizens. That means no torture, no dronings, and respect for international law. In the end a much more successful strategy, and certainly a far cheaper one. Foreigners are not inherently evil, nor are they all plotting your demise. They are people who deserve equality.
Wasn't that the problem (Score:5, Interesting)
The NSA knew about some of the 9-11 hijackers, but it was lost in the noise (and in lack of interdepartmental information sharing). The solution, suck in more noise? Makes little sense to me.
misinformation campaign (Score:5, Interesting)
Yeah, this 'employee' is claiming that they actually asked to collect less but were forced against their will to collect more than they can handle? Flat out bullshit.
They know the cats out of the bag so now they're just going to run with "We've got more information than we can use, so you really have nothing to worry about us hoarding all your data and in fact the more we collect the safer you are!"
Where have we seen this before? Oh that's right, "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!"
(captcha: seducing)
The point is that they can target YOU (Score:5, Interesting)
This mass collection is not about what they can process or correlate with terrorism or whatever. This massive amount is dangerous because they can target individuals. You simply can not assume that all this power will be used for the good of the nation, the inner workings of this huge system are manned by humans. They are prone to corruption, bribery, self interest and so on.
This much power with this little accountability is just bound to be used for personal gain. Imagine if some worker of this system decides he really does not like his neighbor guts. He could target that individual and discover that for example he is having an affair and the disclose that information to cause harm to that individual in particular. Well change that neighbor to some politician that is contrary to the current governing party.
The funny thing is that Metal Gear Solid 2 foretold all this more than a decade ago.
Never, but Never (Score:4, Interesting)
,
But never, ever dare ask why so many wish to do harm to the Imperial Us and our henchman, upon pain of treasonous death.