EFF, Greenpeace Fly Blimp Over NSA's Utah Datacenter; Launch Campaign To Stop Illegal Internet Spying

from the taking-it-to-the-skies dept

Earlier this week, EFF’s Parker Higgins noted that he was about to head on a secretive “adventure to Utah” — and now it’s come out that he was actually there to fly a blimp over the NSA’s infamous datacenter in Bluffdale, Utah. You know the one. It’s received plenty of attention over the past few years, as it was designed to store a ton of electronic data that the NSA previously didn’t have room for. Either way, EFF and Greenpeace teamed up to launch a new campaign called Stand Against Spying, and took to the skies in the blimp to get it some attention.

You can also see a brief video of the blimp taking off. If you look closely, you’ll see the big arrow pointing downward from the blimp saying “NSA Illegal Spying Below.” The blimp — technically a thermal airship called the A.E. Bates, apparently flew over the center for about an hour. In an interview with the Guardian, Higgins noted just how enormous the datacenter appears to be from above:

“The data center is this massive, sprawling complex. I’ve seen pictures of it, but it’s different from the air. You get a sense, really, for the scope of this, the scale of what they’re doing there.”

Check out the Stand Against Spying website, and, in particular, its new Congressional scorecard rating our elected officials on how good of a job they’re doing (or not doing) in protecting our privacy against the NSA. The list, unfortunately, shows how polarized this debate is. There are a lot of “A”s on the list, and a ton of “D”s and “F”s. There are very few “B”s and “C”s in between. The methodology explains how the grades were awarded. Improving grades is pretty straightforward: sponsor or co-sponsor good privacy bills and then vote for them. Simple? Simple. Now, it’s time to move more people into the “A” category.

Filed Under: bluffdale, data center, nsa, protests, spying, surveillance, utah
Companies: eff, greenpeace