I got started on this this morning and then had like five different jobs erupt. Lemme start again:

Every journalist who writes about wiretaps, espionage, the NSA, the NRO or the Internet should be required to read a little Bamford. The dude's been covering the NSA for 30 years.

Fun facts in no particular order:

- Google colocated a data center with the NSA in 2003 in Texas

- Microsoft colocated a data center with the NSA in 2005 in Utah

- The foreign complaints against the NSA are rarely related to human rights, and invariably related to industrial espionage

- The NSA has been caught red-handed time and time again handing over trade secrets gleaned in pursuit of "terrorism" to American companies for economic advantage

- Routing telecommunications traffic through the United States is now, has been and shall always be a convenient way to conduct wiretaps on foreign manufacturers without running afoul of the World Trade Organization (we've been very careful to protect the NSA in all trade agreements)

- the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act has been used as justification for economic spying since 1977 - Woolsey is straight up about it

why on earth would these "don't be evil" companies be in bed with the NSA?

IT'S THE MONEY, STUPID.

Everyone's all twitterpated over PRISM like they can't believe the NSA would do such a thing when for fuck's sake, people, the NSA has had all ( ALL ) voice and data traffic in the world running into its servers since 2003. That "warrantless wiretapping" everyone freaked out about in 2006? THEY NEVER STOPPED.

Read this. The NSA has had software that allows them to mine voice traffic for context since 1989. They've had carte blanche to mine ALL OF IT ( ALL OF IT - ALL THE DATA - ALL THE VOICE - EV.RY.THING ) for a mutherfucking decade.

And now people are all "holy shit they're still spying on us?"

* * *

That said:

These people had every email the Tsarniev brothers ever sent. It did nothing. They had all the voice traffic and emails associated with Bengazi. It did nothing. They've had total, unrestricted access to anything they want and they still are ineffectual - UBL wasn't caught because someone hacked his gmail account, UBL was caught because someone read the HUMINT right.

Look. The NSA doesn't want a sip, they want a firehose. They've been able to make that firehose wider and wider. It's never going to stop. However, their ability to actually drink from the firehose has gone down in the past 20 years because there's so much more water to drink.

...Which journalists would tell you if they read a little Bamford.

I'm big on privacy. I think there ought to be an amendment guaranteeing it. It offends me to my core that the NSA could read this right now if they wanted. But I'm also aware that they're not, because that's not how they roll.

Know who should be offended by PRISM?

Alibaba and Baidu.

And I'll bet they are.