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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsThe NSA Searches Ten Times as Much of the Internet as It Said It Does
The National Security Agency assured Americans last week that it only surveils a tiny percentage of the web data it collects. But it turns out the NSA screwed up the math, and that percentage was off by an order of magnitude.
That error is in a document released by the agency on the heels of the president's speech earlier this month announcing measures to review NSA surveillance. We described the math at stake last week, but the pertinent section is this:
Unfortunately, if you do the math in suggested by that paragraph, you don't get that tiny percentage, 0.00004 percent, or 4 parts per 10 million. It's actually 0.0004 percent, with one fewer zero or 10 times as much as the NSA suggested. It's ten dimes on the basketball court, not one. (See the math at the bottom of this post.)
That's significant largely because of the weight the NSA puts on its percentages...
<snip>
http://www.theatlanticwire.com/politics/2013/08/nsa-better-data-collection-math/68490/
Response to villager (Original post)
Post removed
DisgustipatedinCA
(12,530 posts)If you just want to rid yourself of frustrations, that's one thing. If you're attempting to badger people into changing their minds, however, you don't understand much about human nature, nor do you understand the implications of this scandal. Call me HOF all you want if it makes you feel good. This will not cause me to accept the creeping evil going on under our noses.
villager
(26,001 posts)...given that it's all they have left.
(Note to actual junior high schoolers: I realize many of you are in fact more mature than many of the posters here!)
uponit7771
(90,336 posts)...say we should?
tia
No, the gov is NOT "spying" on everyone....that's crazy on its face...
I drive on a road, camera records my car and stores teh data on a database and looks it up later does NOT... NOT
equal spying.
If the camera searched IN my car then that would be spying...
EDIT = I've been prohibted from posting on the thread
mindwalker_i
(4,407 posts)wiping its collective behind with the constitution, arresting journalists who are trying to tell you how much the government is breaking the law, and you just want to sit back and take it in the ass?
Either you're totally stupid or well-paid.
uponit7771
(90,336 posts)...their real intentions?!
DisgustipatedinCA
(12,530 posts)Republicans (and I guess you?) deal in fake scandals, like Benghazi and the IRS stuff. Others of us save the word scandal for really bad stuff, like Obama's domestic surveillance program. When you see someone demonizing everything the President does, you know that person isn't possessed of much knowledge. By the same token, when you see someone praising everything the President does, you know there's not much cogitation going on upstairs. Life is a little more nuanced than you'd like to believe.
villager
(26,001 posts)Rex
(65,616 posts)The desperation is starting to look like comedy now.
Luminous Animal
(27,310 posts)DisgustipatedinCA
(12,530 posts)I never knew it would talk back to me 25 years later.
Luminous Animal
(27,310 posts)cthulu2016
(10,960 posts)I wrote a whole thing a few days back about this seeming math error. I cam up with 4 parts in 100,000 also, not 4 parts in a million, but upon further examination I concluded that that I was making an error in multiplying the numbers directly and lost track of the fact that it is percentages which came into play in some odd way.
I don't recall exactly what went on, but I came to believe that the NSA calculation was correct, but phrased baddly, and deleted my objection.
At some point in the calculation, because some number was a percent it meant that when multiplying, the number itself had to first be divided by 100, creating the discrepency.
Or something.
It will be interesting to see if the Atlantic fell into the same trap, or whether I was right the first time and talked myself out of it.
(I am very much not an NSA apologist, but math is math so it's a narrow question)
villager
(26,001 posts)<snip>
Between the second quarter of 2011 and the first of 2012, the NSA committed about 7.5 privacy violations each day. Which was the NSA's point: of the 20 million queries a month, only a tiny, tiny percentage violate Americans' privacy. But a tiny percentage of a big number gives you seven privacy violations every 24 hours.
The NSA's incorrect .00004 percent figure was picked up by a variety of outlets at CNN and the Daily Mail, for example. Ten times a very, very small number is still a very, very small number, but it's a small number that represents 10 times as much surveillance as the NSA originally indicated.
Update, 5:00 p.m.: Vanee' Vines of the NSA responded to our question about the calculation over email:
Our figure is valid; the classified information that goes into the number is more complicated than whats in your calculation.
We asked for further clarification of the discrepancy between the numbers. Vines replied:
Our overall number is valid. Im not sure why youre calling this a discrepancy when the number in the white paper is valid.
frylock
(34,825 posts)LiberalEsto
(22,845 posts)to keep them busy.
Progressive dog
(6,903 posts)1.6% and .025% are right. It's 4 ppm, not .4.
JaneyVee
(19,877 posts)warrprayer
(4,734 posts)is more like they spy on 100% of everything.