re: #152 Gus

The other thing people are missing here about the Gellman story is that it’s about a specific case of the bomb maker, Shahzad. This wasn’t just random metadata collection. It was basically a stake out of Shahzad. Specifically targeted surveillance. It wasn’t some random voyeuristic activity. And of course the NSA can get a whole boatload of information during these operations. There are methods to minimize what’s swept up during these op.

The fundamental thing people don’t realize is that the NSA wants to filter out stuff. It wants to discard the irrelevant.