When terrorism in the big concern, droid strikes are used against real threats. General espionage is used to figure out what the real threats are.
I guess they'd still be hoovering up everything they could, just in case, if it weren't for the threat of terrorism. Public opinion is strategically important (if a foreign power starts a war, how will their people react?), but it wouldn't be so important.
Next on the NSA revelations list: A backdoor software "implant" capable of exploiting holes in everything from Froyo to KitKat, and which subverts the device's power management circuitry, such that a remote command can short-circuit and overheat the battery. Results, and especially the likelihood of explosion, depend strongly on battery capacity and charge state, but in-house testing suggests probability of fire should be ca. 95%+ across all device models susceptible to the implant.
(Speaking of which: "Implant", I like that choice of term, it's got just the cyberpunk flavor today's world needs.)
true, but as we've come to see, a big proportion of the spying efforts of the NSA are being directed towards information gathering, for various other reasons than threat assessment. e.g. i don't think many people would have believed the NSA to be spying on US allies, or being involved in industrial espionage.
I guess they'd still be hoovering up everything they could, just in case, if it weren't for the threat of terrorism. Public opinion is strategically important (if a foreign power starts a war, how will their people react?), but it wouldn't be so important.