NSA Deputy Director Chris Inglis (center), testifies at a congressional hearing on intelligence

NSA Deputy Director Chris Inglis (center), testifies at a congressional hearing on intelligence J. Scott Applewhite/AP

A Free Society Cannot Escape All Terrorism

An NSA official illustrates the totalitarian temptation in bureaucracies charged with stopping 100 percent of attacks. By Conor Friedersdorf

The NSA's outgoing deputy director, Chris Inglis, has given a wide-ranging interview to NPR, where host Steve Inskeep asked about the practice of collecting and storing information on the telephone calls of virtually all Americans. That program requires money, manpower, and time. It is politically controversial. And a presidential review doubted that it stopped any terrorist attacks.

So has it been worth the costs? Inglis, who incidentally claims that it played a role in stopping one terrorist attack, says yes. "I think we as a nation have to ask ourselves the policy question of what risks do we want to cover," he said. "Do we want to cover 100 percent of the risk? Or do we want to perhaps take a risk that from time to time something will get through? 9/11 was the single execution, it was the execution of a single plot with multiple threats. And about 3,000 people lost their lives that day. That's one terrorist plot coming to fruition. If that is an acceptable cost, if we can say, we can take the risk that we'll miss something, then we don't need to have all of the tools that cover these various seams."

(Related: The NSA's Surveillance Programs Aren't Making Us Any Safer)

That is a worrisome answer. It displays just the sort of attitude I warned about in "Counterterrorism and the Totalitarian Temptation." A signals-intelligence agency charged with anticipating attacks from state actors can focus surveillance on a small group of foreign elites. In contrast, virtually any individual could carry out a terrorist attack of some sort. If a signals-intelligence agency attempts "to cover 100 percent of the risk," its leaders will constantly be intruding more deeply into the privacy of citizens, because there is, in fact, no 100 percent solution, only ever-increasing-because-always-inadequate attempts at total-information awareness. (Even Vladimir Putin, who transgresses against privacy and civil liberties far more than would be permitted in the U.S., can't eliminate the terrorist threat.) In fact, later in the interview, Inglis seems to contradict his earlier answer and acknowledges that covering 100 percent of the risk is imprudent:

INSKEEP: You're dealing with, you know, billions of communications around the world.

INGLIS: Right.

INSKEEP: Do you actually feel that you have the technical capability to monitor all the communications that you need to monitor? Or a sufficient number of them?

INGLIS: If the answer at the end of the day has to be a hundred percent confidence that we know all threats to all things at all times, of course not. We don't have that sort of god's eye view. We don't have that omniscient capability. And so there's a reasonable balance. The Europeans actually have a nice turn of phrase for this. Our European counterparts say that when you try to achieve the right balance between security and privacy, you need to think in terms of necessity and proportionality. Right?

Do you have some necessity to essentially incur upon, right, the otherwise private affairs of individuals of interest to you? And if you do, have you done that with certain—have you done that with the aspect of proportionality such that only in proportion to the nature of that threat? And that's really the nature of how we apply instruments of national power like intelligence. You need to make sure that you have, at the end of the day, achieved some balance in that regard. We are neither omniscient nor unknowing. Right? We try to find that sweet spot in between. 

That answer is much more reasonable.

Let's apply it to Inglis' earlier question: Should the NSA operate in a way that covers less than 100 percent of America's terrorism exposure, potentially risking another attack on the scale of 9/11? Even when phrased in that most emotionally manipulative way, the answer is, "Yes, of course it should." To forgo certain counterterrorism efforts and "risk one terrorist plot coming to fruition" is only to acknowledge the hard reality we cannot make ourselves invulnerable to terrorism, especially if we're to retain any privacy or protection against an all-knowing state. Failing to accept that reality ends in what Eben Moglin calls the “procedures of totalitarianism.”

The dangers of the 100 percent threshold and the absurdity of invoking it become even clearer when we think of every other risk that the U.S. government guards against. Auto accidents and firearms both kill far more innocents than terrorism. Americans' preference, revealed in actual policy, is to bear risks in those realms orders of magnitude greater than they face from international terrorism. 

But terrorism is psychologically scarier, and Americans are less willing to hear their leaders speak about it candidly and rationally, so few elected officials will acknowledge that if the NSA is charged with eliminating 100 percent of the risk due to terrorism—as some say it is—privacy and civil liberties are being infringed upon. Inglis is right that we, as a nation, have to ask ourselves what risks we want to cover, and we've already decided on certain answers as a country: We want to guard against the risk of government infringing on the rights of the people, so our Constitution disallows general warrants, presumes that voters are aware of the policies approved by the people they're charged with reelecting or ousting from office every two years, and calls for particularized suspicion. Within the letter and spirit of those constraints, all sorts of things can and should be done to reduce the risk of mass casualty terrorist attacks. But the risk cannot be eliminated. 

X
This website uses cookies to enhance user experience and to analyze performance and traffic on our website. We also share information about your use of our site with our social media, advertising and analytics partners. Learn More / Do Not Sell My Personal Information
Accept Cookies
X
Cookie Preferences Cookie List

Do Not Sell My Personal Information

When you visit our website, we store cookies on your browser to collect information. The information collected might relate to you, your preferences or your device, and is mostly used to make the site work as you expect it to and to provide a more personalized web experience. However, you can choose not to allow certain types of cookies, which may impact your experience of the site and the services we are able to offer. Click on the different category headings to find out more and change our default settings according to your preference. You cannot opt-out of our First Party Strictly Necessary Cookies as they are deployed in order to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting the cookie banner and remembering your settings, to log into your account, to redirect you when you log out, etc.). For more information about the First and Third Party Cookies used please follow this link.

Allow All Cookies

Manage Consent Preferences

Strictly Necessary Cookies - Always Active

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Sale of Personal Data, Targeting & Social Media Cookies

Under the California Consumer Privacy Act, you have the right to opt-out of the sale of your personal information to third parties. These cookies collect information for analytics and to personalize your experience with targeted ads. You may exercise your right to opt out of the sale of personal information by using this toggle switch. If you opt out we will not be able to offer you personalised ads and will not hand over your personal information to any third parties. Additionally, you may contact our legal department for further clarification about your rights as a California consumer by using this Exercise My Rights link

If you have enabled privacy controls on your browser (such as a plugin), we have to take that as a valid request to opt-out. Therefore we would not be able to track your activity through the web. This may affect our ability to personalize ads according to your preferences.

Targeting cookies may be set through our site by our advertising partners. They may be used by those companies to build a profile of your interests and show you relevant adverts on other sites. They do not store directly personal information, but are based on uniquely identifying your browser and internet device. If you do not allow these cookies, you will experience less targeted advertising.

Social media cookies are set by a range of social media services that we have added to the site to enable you to share our content with your friends and networks. They are capable of tracking your browser across other sites and building up a profile of your interests. This may impact the content and messages you see on other websites you visit. If you do not allow these cookies you may not be able to use or see these sharing tools.

If you want to opt out of all of our lead reports and lists, please submit a privacy request at our Do Not Sell page.

Save Settings
Cookie Preferences Cookie List

Cookie List

A cookie is a small piece of data (text file) that a website – when visited by a user – asks your browser to store on your device in order to remember information about you, such as your language preference or login information. Those cookies are set by us and called first-party cookies. We also use third-party cookies – which are cookies from a domain different than the domain of the website you are visiting – for our advertising and marketing efforts. More specifically, we use cookies and other tracking technologies for the following purposes:

Strictly Necessary Cookies

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Functional Cookies

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Performance Cookies

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Sale of Personal Data

We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.

Social Media Cookies

We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.

Targeting Cookies

We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.