How Effective is the NSA’s Fight Against Terrorism?

We are all aware of the NSA’s use of tools such as XKeyscore and Prism to gain access to all of our information and internet activities and, in a nutshell, spy on us. The claim is that it is to protect us. But how effective are these methods in preventing acts of terrorism?

               

According to the training materials for XKeyscore that Edward Snowden leaked to The Guardian, by 2008, 300 terrorist had been captured (Wills). When asking yourself how many groups of individuals would have the guts to attempt to terrorize a country or wage war on it, this number seems extreme and it does in fact sound as if these methods are indeed effective. However, this summer, after the leak from Snowden, the NSA disclosed that by using these methods of spying, 52 “terrorist events” had been interrupted (“NSA”). This number contradicts the 300 given in the training materials for just XKeyscore, let alone the whole NSA. The chief of the NSA later said that those numbers had been dramatically exaggerated, and that only one or two terrorist plots had been foiled. This information was followed by the deputy director stating that only one terrorist plot had been foiled. As it turns out, the plot was a taxi driver who had been sending monetary funds to a group of individuals who, were in fact, labeled as a terrorist group in 2008. The FBI declared, however, that the individual sending the funds was in no way associated with the group, and his acts of support were more about loyalty and politics (“NSA”).

               

So that brings me back to my main question. How effective is the NSA’s methods of collecting data in keeping us safe from terrorist? Dozens of websites I visited talked about the NSA being in an uproar against Snowden because of his leak and how terrorist now have the information of how we have been tracking them, which will make these methods useless. It seems to me, however, that they were already useless, which brings me to a second question. What is the real reason for the government using programs such as XKeyscore and Prism? I’m not a radical who thinks that the government is out to take our freedom and use our information against us, but I do have to question their motives as of late. If this information is indeed being used only to spy on us, what exactly are they looking for? What good can billions of new data being sent to their databases do if it’s not being used to track terrorist or terrorist plots? These are the questions that I ponder when I read articles about the reality of these programs and how inefficient they seem to be, and it makes me wonder, what else are they doing that we do not yet know about?

Citations:

"NSA Spying Did Not Result In a SINGLE Foiled Terrorist Plot." Web log post. Washingtons Blog. N.p., 15 Oct. 2013. Web. 28 Oct. 2013. <http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/10/nsa-spying-did-not-result-in-one-stopped-terrorist-plot-and-the-government-actually-did-spy-on-the-bad-guys-before-911.html>.

Wills, Amanda. "New Snowden Leak: NSA Program Taps All You Do Online." Web. CNN. Cable News Network, 01 Aug. 2013. Web. 28 Oct. 2013. <http://www.cnn.com/2013/07/31/tech/web/snowden-leak-xkeyscore/index.html?iref=allsearch>.