US Surveillance and Fiber Optic Cables

While Ben has already noted the big NY Times report on the FISA court, I thought I would call attention to the other big story in today's paper -- the Washington Post article on how the US maintains access to data flows through the large fiber optic cable networks.  Perhaps it is me, but I am always less interested in the legal distinctions being drawn and more fascinated with the technical mechanics of precisely =how= we achieve certain results.  In that regard, the Post report is fascinating.  Here's a sample from the introduction:

The U.S. government had a problem: Spying in the digital age required access to the fiber-optic cables traversing the world’s oceans, carrying torrents of data at the speed of light. And one of the biggest operators of those cables was being sold to an Asian firm, potentially complicating American surveillance efforts. Enter “Team Telecom.” In months of private talks, the team of lawyers from the FBI and the departments of Defense, Justice and Homeland Security demanded that the company maintain what amounted to an internal corporate cell of American citizens with government clearances. Among their jobs, documents show, was ensuring that surveillance requests got fulfilled quickly and confidentially.

What one discovers is that law matters -- but in an odd way.  Here, the US government used the leverage of its power to approve (or reject) a corporate takeover as a means of ensuring its continued access to the fiber optic network.  It's a useful and cautionary tale.