While new disclosures this week have exposed inept oversight and gross privacy violations within the National Security Agency, news out of North Carolina has revealed that the NSA is spending $60.75 million on another brand new facility.
In the midst of an international debate focused on how the United
States’ premier spy agency has conducted dragnet surveillance
over much of the world, including at home, the NSA is expanding
even further. The News & Observer reported on Thursday that
North Carolina State University in Raleigh, NC is receiving a
$60.75 million grant from the NSA to develop a top-secret data
analysis lab.
The grant, the paper reported, is three times larger than any
award ever received by the university in the school’s history.
Randy Woodson, the school’s chancellor, said Thursday that the
deal had been in the works for three years. He said he hoped the
data center would make North Carolina a more attractive
destination for technology companies. Woodson predicted that the
project would create 100 jobs over five years.
“We appreciate the confidence of the National Security Agency
to select NC State for this groundbreaking endeavor,” Woodson
said in a statement. “Not only will it enhance the academic
experience for our students and faculty, it will also add to the
economic prosperity of our community through new jobs, new
industry and new partnerships.”
Many details on the project have been kept secret because of
national security, according to officials. But North Carolina
State already has contracts with the Department of Defense,
helping the agency research technology which will help soldiers
identify improvised explosive devices and expand their foreign
language capabilities, among other functions.
The NSA has come under harsh scrutiny in recent months due to the
disclosure of classified surveillance programs which the
government has used to justify monitoring the communications of
Americans, as well as the international community. Internal
emails published by the News & Observer reveal that North
Carolina State originally intended to announce their deal with
the NSA just before the leaks were published but decided to delay
in fear of potential blowback.
“A very important announcement about our new NSA-funded
Laboratory for Analytic Sciences was suppose to be made public
this morning, but with that bit out of The Guardian newspaper on
NSA collecting phone records of Verizon customers — everyone
thought it best to not make the announcement just yet,” Randy
Avent, the associate vice chancellor for research at NCSU, wrote
in a message to other administrators. “By the way — our Lab is
just that — a research program studying the fundamental science
behind analytics. It is not a storage facility for classified
data and does not work with any data like that mentioned in the
article.”
The delayed announcement comes after another disclosure which
further harmed the NSA’s reputation. The Washington Post
published top-secret documents Thursday night which provide a
glimpse into just how often the NSA breaks the law and invades
the privacy of Americans. Thousands of violations were recorded
in each of the years since the NSA’s power was expanded in 2008.
Republished from: RT