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I legit don't believe they can store all that data. Youtube alone creates too much data for them to process and handle. They must be storing either a subset or

I legit don't believe they can store all that data. Youtube alone creates too much data for them to process and handle. They must be storing either a subset or only partial metadata.

specto 4y ago
likely netflow data.
calvinmorrison 4y ago
with large datasets like bioinformatics you often compress the data by extracting features and building matrixes, then only keeping things that score above a threshold
- Scoundreller 4y ago
  Sounds right. I like to say we’re all on a list and it just matters where you rank on it. And the precision is only good when you rank high on it. No different than google search results. The accuracy of the 7th page of results just doesn’t matter.
getcrunk 4y ago
I mean more than a few x00 someones have to actually know the answer to that question. Shocked it hasn't been leaked.
perrylaj 4y ago
I'm on the other side of the fence - I believe they can store all they need to. Backdoors into Google, AWS, and others were strongly hinted at if not fully exposed with all the leaks back in the Snowden days, so US Agencies may not even need to store some of the bulky stuff. But given the vast size and number of datacenters operated by US agencies, it seems likely they have a LOT of storage capacity. http://worldstopdatacenters.com/government-data-centers/ http://worldstopdatacenters.com/government-data-centers/
eointierney 4y ago
I legit believe they store everything they can because they've been doing exactly this for longer than anyone else. They are _the_ experts in metadata management.
StanislavPetrov 4y ago
The NSA has an unlimited budget to store all the data they want. They have massive, billion-dollar data centers around the country (and the world?). The one in Utah is perhaps the best known. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utah_Data_Center https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utah_Data_Center
- ReactiveJelly 4y ago
  Nothing is unlimited. If it cut into our tank budget, or anything old retirees care about, something would happen.
  - StanislavPetrov 4y ago
    >Nothing is unlimited. If it cut into our tank budget, or anything old retirees care about, something would happen. Nothing is unlimited, especially inflation. The idea of a "budget" when the FED can (and does) create trillions of dollars out of thin air with a few keystrokes is antiquated. They can - and do - devote whatever resources they desire for "national security". https://www.usdebtclock.org/ https://www.usdebtclock.org/
ReactiveJelly 4y ago
If I was them, I would not back up YouTube, but I might carefully scrape and discard. Hell, if I was a _benevolent_ surveillance program, I'd probably run routine searches for illegal stuff on YouTube, both to find it myself, and to make sure YouTube's tripwires are working. There is so much low-hanging fruit in terms of "interesting secrets per byte" Like, I could believe all SMS messages are stored for a year or so. Some random source says, "Over 6 billion texts are sent every day". If a text is about 140 characters, and you use a dumb image classifier to transcribe photos as "Nude woman", "nude man", "dick pic", "image macro", "guns", etc., that's only about 1 TB per day, right? 365 TB to keep all US text messages for a year? Maybe my source is wrong. That sounds low. But, it's just text. Maybe it's right. In fact, the upper bound for all US keyboard input for a year must be below 4.6 petabytes. (350 million people typing 365 days a year, 16 hours a day, 40 words per minute, 1 bit of entropy per character after compression, 8 bits per word)
carapace 4y ago
> While the actual capacity is classified for NATIONAL SECURITY REASONS, we can say this: The Utah Data Center was built with future expansion in mind and the ultimate capacity will definitely be "alottabytes"! https://nsa.gov1.info/utah-data-center/ https://nsa.gov1.info/utah-data-center/

I legit don't believe they can store all that data. Youtube alone creates too much data for them to process and handle. They must be storing either a subset or only partial metadata.

specto 4y ago

likely netflow data.

calvinmorrison 4y ago

with large datasets like bioinformatics you often compress the data by extracting features and building matrixes, then only keeping things that score above a threshold

Scoundreller 4y ago
Sounds right. I like to say we’re all on a list and it just matters where you rank on it. And the precision is only good when you rank high on it. No different than google search results. The accuracy of the 7th page of results just doesn’t matter.

getcrunk 4y ago

I mean more than a few x00 someones have to actually know the answer to that question. Shocked it hasn't been leaked.

perrylaj 4y ago

I'm on the other side of the fence - I believe they can store all they need to. Backdoors into Google, AWS, and others were strongly hinted at if not fully exposed with all the leaks back in the Snowden days, so US Agencies may not even need to store some of the bulky stuff. But given the vast size and number of datacenters operated by US agencies, it seems likely they have a LOT of storage capacity. http://worldstopdatacenters.com/government-data-centers/ http://worldstopdatacenters.com/government-data-centers/

eointierney 4y ago

I legit believe they store everything they can because they've been doing exactly this for longer than anyone else. They are _the_ experts in metadata management.

StanislavPetrov 4y ago

The NSA has an unlimited budget to store all the data they want. They have massive, billion-dollar data centers around the country (and the world?). The one in Utah is perhaps the best known. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utah_Data_Center https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utah_Data_Center

ReactiveJelly 4y ago
Nothing is unlimited. If it cut into our tank budget, or anything old retirees care about, something would happen.
- StanislavPetrov 4y ago
  >Nothing is unlimited. If it cut into our tank budget, or anything old retirees care about, something would happen. Nothing is unlimited, especially inflation. The idea of a "budget" when the FED can (and does) create trillions of dollars out of thin air with a few keystrokes is antiquated. They can - and do - devote whatever resources they desire for "national security". https://www.usdebtclock.org/ https://www.usdebtclock.org/

ReactiveJelly 4y ago

If I was them, I would not back up YouTube, but I might carefully scrape and discard. Hell, if I was a _benevolent_ surveillance program, I'd probably run routine searches for illegal stuff on YouTube, both to find it myself, and to make sure YouTube's tripwires are working. There is so much low-hanging fruit in terms of "interesting secrets per byte" Like, I could believe all SMS messages are stored for a year or so. Some random source says, "Over 6 billion texts are sent every day". If a text is about 140 characters, and you use a dumb image classifier to transcribe photos as "Nude woman", "nude man", "dick pic", "image macro", "guns", etc., that's only about 1 TB per day, right? 365 TB to keep all US text messages for a year? Maybe my source is wrong. That sounds low. But, it's just text. Maybe it's right. In fact, the upper bound for all US keyboard input for a year must be below 4.6 petabytes. (350 million people typing 365 days a year, 16 hours a day, 40 words per minute, 1 bit of entropy per character after compression, 8 bits per word)

carapace 4y ago

> While the actual capacity is classified for NATIONAL SECURITY REASONS, we can say this: The Utah Data Center was built with future expansion in mind and the ultimate capacity will definitely be "alottabytes"! https://nsa.gov1.info/utah-data-center/ https://nsa.gov1.info/utah-data-center/