The NSA Touches “Only 1.6%” Of Daily Global Internet Traffic

According to a report by Russia Today the NSA is claiming that it “only touches 1.6%” of daily internet traffic. By the standards of percentages, 1.6% is relatively low, but if you factor in just how much 1.6% of daily global traffic would be, well according to the NSA’s own figures it equates to 29.216 Petabytes of the total 1,826 Petabytes transferred daily. To anyone with some basic knowledge that is a lot of information the NSA is able to “touch”.

“According to figures published by a major tech provider, the Internet carries 1,826 Petabytes of information per day. In its foreign intelligence mission, NSA touches about 1.6% of that. However, of the 1.6% of the data, only 0.025% is actually selected for review.” The NSA report stated.

With the NSA claiming to only review 0.025% of that 1.6%, it means each day they review about 0.7304 Petabytes of data. To put that into context the NSA reviews everyday 765,880 Gigabytes of data. Yet the NSA still claims, after reviewing that much data every day, that:

“We do not need to sacrifice civil liberties for the sake of national security; both are integral to who we are as Americans. NSA can and will continue to conduct its operations in a manner that respects both.”

At the end of all that comes the questions. What do they do with the 1.6% of data they touch every day? What does the “review process” entail for that 0.7304 Petabytes of data every day? Are their figures even accurate or truthful? What even gives them the right to touch 1.6% of “global” internet traffic, which is outside their legal jurisdiction of the USA?

What are your thoughts on the NSA “only touching 1.6%” of global internet traffic?

Image courtesy of Heavy.com