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NSA Building $860 Million Data Center In Maryland

Posted by timothy on from the indifferent-to-your-objections dept.

1sockchuck writes "As its current data collection makes headlines, the National Security Agency is continuing to expand its data storage and processing capabilities. The agency recently broke ground on an $860 million data center at Fort Meade, Maryland that will span more than 600,000 square feet. The project will provide additional IT capacity beyond the NSA's controversial Utah data center. The new facility will be supported by 60 megawatts of power and use both air-cooled and liquid-cooled equipment."

2 of 177 comments (clear)

  1. Re:$860 Million by PolygamousRanchKid+ · · Score: 4, Insightful

    "logging machine"...

    On the contrary, the NSA has some great minds working for them, and they are probably doing some very interesting and useful analysis with all that data. The problem is, what great minds create, can be misused by others.

    All this power is supposed to be used to catch terrorists. But now that this database is out in the open, a lot of other folks will find reasons why they must also have access to it.

    Think of a simple police detective at the scene of a murder interviewing potential witnesses and suspects. He could immediately get a topology drawn of who knows who, and which ones have been chatting a lot with each other. Usually the poor policeman needs to do a lot of grunt and foot work to map this out. And get warrants for phone records. This would really help his investigation a lot.

    But do we really want data collected this way to be used that way . . . ? What will prevent a slippery slide of more and more agencies and organizations getting access to this data for their own purposes . . . ? Can the DEA escalate their war on drugs to also be a matter of national security? This info could also help the IRS track down money launderers as well . . . how about the IRS . . . ?

    Now that the government has this "Critical Tool" at their disposal, the more important question is not how can it be used, but how it should not be used.

    --
    Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
  2. Where does the money come from? by OhANameWhatName · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I thought that the US was in debt so far that they're defaulting on the bonds they sold to China? And the government has 860 million to throw around just to find out where their citizens are eating lunch?

    It's amazing that this data centre is worth more to the US government that financial liquidity.