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NSA Plans $1.6 Billion Utah Data Center
July 1st, 2009 : Rich MillerThe National Security Agency is planning to build a massive data center at Fort Williams in Utah, which could eventually include more than 1 million square feet of data center space, reports the Salt Lake Tribune.
The first phase of the project will feature an $800 million investment in a 35-megawatt data center, with a second $800 million, 35-megawatt phase to follow. The initial phase is currently in the design stage, with construction scheduled to begin in June 2010 and be completed by March 2013, according to documents (link via Mark Fontecchio). Project specs call for a Tier III raised-floor facility.
The Utah project was enabled by a new funding bill signed last week by President Obama, which also provides money for an expansion of the power infrastructure at Fort Meade, Maryland where the NSA’s primary data center is located. The NSA’s operations at Fort Meade have reportedly been power-strapped since 2006, when the agency maxed out the electric capacity of the Baltimore Gas & Electric power grid.
The NSA facility will be the third huge data center to be built in Utah, which has prevailed in several of the most competitive data center projects in the Western U.S. In May 2008 Oracle Corp. (ORCL) said it would build a $285 million data center in West Jordan. In December West Jordan was also selected as the site for a $334 million eBay data center.
Between them, the three projects represent more than $2.2 billion in data center investment in the state of Utah.
World Wide Wiretap : Refuse Resist
Posted July 12th, 2009[...] attacks are to be welcomed for their transformative nature. Certainly the NSA is not building a $1.6 billion-dollar data center to sit on their hands waiting for an attack, nor are the governments of the UK, Canada, Ireland and [...]
Worldwide wiretap-Corbett Report « FACT – Freedom Against Censorship Thailand
Posted July 30th, 2009[...] [29] http://www.corbettreport.com/articles/20090706_scheuer_false_flag.htm [30] http://www.datacenterknowledge.com/archives/2009/07/01/nsa-plans-16-billion-utah-data-center/ [31] http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/8087530.stm [32] [...]
JayDee
Posted December 13th, 2009Of course the fact that this center is to be located in the middle of the continental US might give some pause, seeing as how they will be tapping into all the INTERNAL communications there, not just the overseas ones they are legally authorized to be monitoring. And the juxtaposition of this facility with the other two mentioned in the article is interesting, wouldn’t you say?
I for one find the government’s assurances that non-terrorism-related information is not being retained by NSA somewhat hard to swallow. Espacially in light of the fact that they are busy building the biggest data storage facility known to man.
Besides, we’ve heard that line before: “Social Security numbers will NEVER be used for anything other than identification for SSA purposes”.
Or the ever popular “No internal communications are being monitored in this program, only overseas calls.” Sure, they’re not MONITORED, just RECORDED en masse until they can find another use for them at some later date.
Easy to see that one coming: “IRS to sweep NSA files for evidence of tax cheaters”, or “INS to examine NSA files for information on aliens in the US”, or – well, you get the idea. Once they HAVE the data, I guarantee you they will invent new and creative ways to mine it. Kiss any privacy you had left goodbye forever.
Neo
Posted December 21st, 2009I don’t think that their collection of massive amounts of data is necessarily “bad”, I mean it is inevitable, n’est pas? Despite how much we think that the NSA is just some evil secret society I really think it does a lot of good. We can only fathom how many threats are constantly apparent in the US (I imagine it is a lot). I am just glad that our country is doing something about it and not sitting on their butts doing nothing. I probably have this weird bias towards them because I want to work for them some day…so you are probably right in some aspects, but I just wanted to clarify that they still do a lot for this country that no one recognizes. I promise that if I work for them I will do my best to protect this country and make it a better place! 
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