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We Just Built Skynet in the Desert, Now What?
Ten years after 9/11, the National Security Agency (NSA) is close to putting the finishing touches on what will be the single biggest spy center in the country. According to James Bamford of WIRED,
this new one million-square foot spy complex in the Utah Desert will
actually be capable of monitoring, intercepting and de-encrypting just
about any message sent over any communication network in the country. It
will be capable of keeping tabs on any civilian in the U.S. or any
foreigner visiting the USA. And it will all be hooked up to federal
computers in Washington, giving it access to the records and databases
of the most powerful government agencies in the country. If all this is
starting to sound a lot like Skynet in the Terminator movies, that’s because, well, it is - minus the Schwarzenegger robots, of course.
The
sheer amount of data that the NSA – and by extension the CIA, FBI and
Pentagon – will be able to collect on both foreigners and its own
civilians is staggering. The $2 billion center, which goes by the
disarmingly bland name of the Utah Data Center, is the final piece in
the puzzle for the Pentagon, which has been attempting to build a Global
Information Grid ever since 9/11. Remember the Total Information
Awareness program of 2003? Well, it’s now here in physical form – and
it’s heavily guarded. In military parlance, it’s not a “soft” target -
the facility has been hardened to the point where a 15,000-pound
vehicle traveling at 50 miles per hour couldn't muscle its way inside.
At its peak, this new surveillance center will be able to handle so
much data that the NSA practically had to coin a new word to describe
it: yottabytes. There are so many servers running this system that the
annual cooling costs are estimated to be $40 million.
That’s quite an electricity bill for a "data center."
That's because this federal spy center goes far beyond what’s already being collected about us online, to explore the “Deep Web” that’s all but invisible to typical search engines. The spy center will also delve into the world of code-breaking and reverse-encryption. Even things that we think are far beyond any type of cyber-penetration will be readily available to the powers-that-be. That’s where things get downright scary. We assume that spambots and spiders slither behind us everywhere we go online, but what do we really know about all the other information that is being tracked about us? What information is being collected about us by security monitors in the streets and satellites overhead? The scope of what's being collected by the NSA is breathlessly thorough in detail, reaching into every area of our lives:
This digital "pocket litter" that each of us leaves behind us may
sound harmless – but that's until all of this highly unstructured data
gets dumped into a supercomputing capable of mining all this data and
producing patterns and insights. This “pocket litter” is no longer
trash once it can be used to construct ever-more precise profiles of
everyday civilians and predict future behaviors.
“Cybersecurity” and “the war on terror” are handy little buzzwords for enabling governments to extend their cyber-surveillance over every aspect of our lives. At the end of the day, pure democracy and absolute authoritarianism are really just flip sides of the same coin. This is precisely why dystopian novels such as George Orwell’s 1984 and Yevgeny Zamyatin’s We are so terrifying. Authoritarian regimes always start out with a willingness to help - not enslave - its civilians. War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery. Ignorance is Strength.
A government that claims to protect its citizens by spying on them is a government that needs to be watched, monitored and held under strict surveillance by its own citizens.
See Also: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/03/ff_nsadatacenter/all/1
That’s quite an electricity bill for a "data center."
That's because this federal spy center goes far beyond what’s already being collected about us online, to explore the “Deep Web” that’s all but invisible to typical search engines. The spy center will also delve into the world of code-breaking and reverse-encryption. Even things that we think are far beyond any type of cyber-penetration will be readily available to the powers-that-be. That’s where things get downright scary. We assume that spambots and spiders slither behind us everywhere we go online, but what do we really know about all the other information that is being tracked about us? What information is being collected about us by security monitors in the streets and satellites overhead? The scope of what's being collected by the NSA is breathlessly thorough in detail, reaching into every area of our lives:
"Flowing through its servers and routers
and stored in near-bottomless databases will be all forms of
communication, including the complete contents of private emails, cell
phone calls, and Google searches, as well as all sorts of personal
data trails—parking receipts, travel itineraries, bookstore purchases,
and other digital “pocket litter.” It is, in some measure, the
realization of the “total information awareness” program created
during the first term of the Bush administration—an effort that was
killed by Congress in 2003 after it caused an outcry over its
potential for invading Americans’ privacy."
“Cybersecurity” and “the war on terror” are handy little buzzwords for enabling governments to extend their cyber-surveillance over every aspect of our lives. At the end of the day, pure democracy and absolute authoritarianism are really just flip sides of the same coin. This is precisely why dystopian novels such as George Orwell’s 1984 and Yevgeny Zamyatin’s We are so terrifying. Authoritarian regimes always start out with a willingness to help - not enslave - its civilians. War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery. Ignorance is Strength.
A government that claims to protect its citizens by spying on them is a government that needs to be watched, monitored and held under strict surveillance by its own citizens.
UTAH DATA CENTER
When construction is completed in 2013, the heavily fortified $2 billion facility in Bluffdale will encompass 1 million square feet.
1 Visitor control center
A $9.7 million facility for ensuring that only cleared personnel gain access.2 Administration
Designated space for technical support and administrative personnel.3 Data halls
Four 25,000-square-foot facilities house rows and rows of servers.4 Backup generators and fuel tanks
Can power the center for at least three days.5 Water storage and pumping
Able to pump 1.7 million gallons of liquid per day.6 Chiller plant
About 60,000 tons of cooling equipment to keep servers from overheating.7 Power substation
An electrical substation to meet the center’s estimated 65-megawatt demand.8 Security
Video surveillance, intrusion detection, and other protection will cost more than $10 million.
Source: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Conceptual Site plan
See Also: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/03/ff_nsadatacenter/all/1
