I dug this commentary out of last week's
Foreign Policy, and I am actually--honestly, truly--very interested in what Languish thinks, what with so many interesting generational-studies discussions we've had in the past. :lol:
Some of you may recognize the author.
QuoteSpy Kids
A sci-fi visionary on why the children of tomorrow are the NSA's biggest nightmare.
BY CHARLES STROSS | AUGUST 28, 2013
In the 21st century, the U.S. National Security Agency (and other espionage agencies) face a storm of system-wide problems that I haven't seen anybody talking about. The problems are sociological, and they threaten to undermine the way the Western security state operates.
The big government/civil service agencies are old. The NSA's roots stretch back to the State Department's "Black Chamber" (officially dissolved by Secretary of State Henry Stimson in 1929 with the immortal words "Gentlemen do not read each other's mail"). The CIA is a creation of the late 1940s. J. Edgar Hoover's FBI was established as the Bureau of Investigation in 1908. These organizations are products of the 20th-century industrial state, and they are used to running their human resources and internal security processes as if they're still living in the days of the "job for life" culture. Potential spooks-to-be were tapped early (often while at school or university), vetted, and then given a safe sinecure along with regular monitoring to ensure they stayed on the straight-and-narrow all the way to the gold watch and pension. Because that's how we all used to work, at least if we were civil servants or white-collar paper-pushers back in the 1950s.
But outside the walled garden of the civil service, things don't work that way anymore. A major consequence of the 1970s resurgence of neoliberal economics was the deregulation of labor markets and the deliberate destruction of the job-for-life culture (partly because together they were a powerful lever for dislodging unionism and the taproots of left-wing power in the West, and partly because a liquid labor market made entrepreneurial innovation and corporate restructuring easier).
Government departments may be structured on old-fashioned lines, but their managers aren't immune to outside influences and they frequently attempt reforms, in the name of greater efficiency, that shadow the popular private-sector fads of the day. One side effect of making corporate restructuring easier was the rush toward outsourcing, and today around 70 percent of the U.S. intelligence budget is spent on outside contractors. And it's a big budget -- well over $50 billion a year. Some chunks go to heavy metal (the National Reconnaissance Office is probably the biggest high-spending agency you've never heard of: it builds spy satellites), but a lot goes to people. People to oil the machines. People who work for large contracting organizations. Organizations that increasingly rely on contractors rather than permanent labor to retain "flexibility."
Here's the problem: The organizations are now running into outside contractors who grew up in the globalized, liquid labor world of Generation X and Generation Y, with Generation Z fast approaching.
We experience cultural continuity with our parents' and our children's generations. Even when we don't see eye to eye with our parents on political questions or we sigh in despair about our kids' fashion sense or taste in music, we generally have a handle on what makes them tick. But a human lifetime seldom spans more than three generations, and the sliding window of one's generation screens out that which came before and that which comes after; they lie outside our personal experience. We fool ourselves into thinking that our national culture is static and slow-moving, that we are the inheritors of a rich tradition. But if we could go back three or four generations, we would find ourselves surrounded by aliens -- people for whom a North Atlantic crossing by sail was as slow and risky as a mission to Mars, people who took it for granted that some races were naturally inferior and that women were too emotionally unstable to be allowed to vote. The bedrock of our cultural tradition is actually quicksand. We reject many of our ancestors' cherished beliefs and conveniently forget others, not realizing that, in turn, our grandchildren may do the same to ours.
Let's focus on the next three generations and try to discern some patterns.
Generation X's parents, the baby boomers, grew up in the 1950s. It was not unusual to expect to work in the same job for life. They seldom traveled internationally because it was expensive and slow, and their cultural environment was predominantly defined by their nationality -- an extraordinary international incursion such as the arrival of Beatlemania in the 1960s was shocking precisely because it was so unusual.
With few exceptions, Generation X never had the job for life. Members of the generation are used to nomadic employment, hire-and-fire, right-to-work laws, the whole nine yards of organized-labor deracination. But they also grew up in the age of cheap jet travel, on a globe shrunk so small that 48 hours and two weeks' average wages could take you to the antipodes. (In 1813, you could pay two weeks' average wages and take 48 hours to travel 100 to 200 miles by stagecoach. In 2013, that can take you from Maryland to Hong Kong -- and then on to Moscow.)
Generation Y's parents are Generation X. Generation Y comprises the folks who serve your coffee in Starbucks and build software at Google. Generation Y has never thought of jobs as permanent things. Most Generation Y folks will stare at you blankly if you talk about loyalty to one's employer; the old feudal arrangement ("we'll give you a job for life and look after you as long as you look out for the Organization") is something their grandparents ranted about, but it's about as real to them as the divine right of kings. Employers like Google or Facebook that provide good working conditions are the exception, not the rule. Employers are alien hive-mind colony intelligences that will fuck you over for the bottom line on the quarterly balance sheet. They'll give you a laptop and tell you to hot-desk or work at home so that they can save money on office floor space and furniture. They'll dangle the offer of a permanent job over your head but keep you on a zero-hours contract for as long as is convenient.
On the other hand: Generation Y has grown up in a world where travel is cheap and communication is nearly free. Their cultural zeitgeist is less parochial than that of their grandparents, more global, infused with Japanese anime and Swedish heavy metal, as well as local media produce. This is the world they grew up in: This is the world that defines their expectations.
The problem is, you can't run a national security organization if you can't rely on the loyalty of the majority of your workers -- both to the organization and to the state it serves. At one time, continuity of employment meant that the agencies at least knew their people, but there is now an emerging need to security-clear vast numbers of temporary and transient workers with no intrinsic sense of loyalty to the organization.
The NSA and its fellow swimmers in the acronym soup of the intelligence-industrial complex are increasingly dependent on nomadic contractor employees and increasingly subject to staff churn. Security clearance is carried out wholesale by other contractor organizations that specialize in human resource management, but even they are subject to the same problem: Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
We human beings are primates. We have a deeply ingrained set of cultural and interpersonal behavioral rules that we violate only at social cost. One of these rules, essential for a tribal organism, is bilaterality: Loyalty is a two-way street. (Another is hierarchy: Yield to the boss.) Such rules are not iron-bound or immutable -- we're not robots -- but our new hive superorganism employers don't obey them instinctively, and apes and monkeys and hominids tend to revert to tit-for-tat strategies readily when they're unsure of their relative status. Perceived slights result in retaliation, and blundering, human-blind organizations can bruise an employee's ego without even noticing. And slighted or bruised employees who lack instinctive loyalty, because the culture they come from has spent generations systematically destroying social hierarchies and undermining their sense of belonging, are much more likely to start thinking the unthinkable.
Nationalism might seem to provide a bulwark here, buttressing loyalty to the institutions of state with loyalty to the ideals of the state itself. But if the actions of the state deviate too far from the ideals embodied in the foundational myths its citizens believe, cognitive dissonance ensues. The public perception of America as being a democratic republic that values freedom and fairness under the rule of law is diametrically opposed to the secretive practices of the surveillance state. Nationalist loyalty is highly elastic, but can be strained to breaking point. And when that happens, we see public servants who remain loyal to the abstract ideals conclude that the institution itself is committing treason. And an organization that provides no outlet for the concerns of loyal whistle-blowers like Thomas Drake is creating a rod for its own back by convincing the likes of leaker Edward Snowden that it is incapable of reform from within and disloyal to the national ideals it purports to serve.
Snowden is 30; he was born in 1983. Chelsea Manning is 25. Generation Y started around 1980 to 1982. But the signs of disobedience among Generation Y are merely a harbinger of things to come. Next up is Generation Z -- the cohort born since the millennium.
Members of Generation Z are going to come of age in the 2020s, in a world racked by extreme climate events. Many of them will be sibling-less only children, for the demographic transition to a low birthrate/low death rate equilibrium lies generations in their past. They may not be able to travel internationally -- energy costs combined with relative income decline is slowly stripping the middle classes of that capability -- but they'll be products of a third-generation Internet culture.
To the Z cohort, the Internet isn't a separate thing; it has been an integrated part of their lives since infancy. They do not remember a time before the Internet or a life without smartphones. All of them will have had Facebook pages, even though they had to lie about their age to sign up (and even though having a social network presence is officially a no-no for spooks). All of them have acquired long histories visible on the Internet, even if only through the tagged photographs of their schoolmates. Mostly they photograph everything (even though taking photographs or being photographed is officially a no-no for spooks). Many of them even use lifeloggers (which has got to be a career-killer if your career lies in the shadows). They grew up in a surveillance state; they might want privacy, but they are under no illusions that the centers of authority will permit them to have it. Steeply climbing university fees and student-debt loading have turned a traditional degree into their version of Generation X's unattainable job for life; their education will be vocational or acquired piecemeal from MOOCs (massive open online courses), and their careers will be haphazard, casual, and dominated by multiple part-time contracts.
They saw their grandparents' and parents' generations screwed by the great intergenerational transfer of wealth to the baby boomers -- their great-grandparents, many of whom are lingering on into their twilight 80s. To Generation Z's eyes, the boomers and their institutions look like parasitic aliens with incomprehensible values who make irrational demands for absolute loyalty without reciprocity. Worse, the foundational mythology and ideals of the United States will look like a bitter joke, a fun house mirror's distorted reflection of the reality they live with from day to day.
Generation Z will arrive brutalized and atomized by three generations of diminished expectations and dog-eat-dog economic liberalism. Most of them will be so deracinated that they identify with their peers and the global Internet culture more than their great-grandparents' post-Westphalian nation-state. The machineries of the security state may well find them unemployable, their values too alien to assimilate into a model still rooted in the early 20th century. But if you turn the Internet into a panopticon prison and put everyone inside it, where else are you going to be able to recruit the jailers? And how do you ensure their loyalty?
If I were in charge of long-term planning for human resources in any government department, I'd be panicking. Even though it's already too late.
children of tomorrow: tldr
Boo.
You already know what I think Seedy. I've read a few of Strosses books. They were okay.
Hey, yeah, Glasshouse guy. He rocks.
Assuming the premise that loyalty is gone (true) and that secrecy is impossible, the solution for counterintelligence seems to naturally arise from the situation: transparency will become virtually total and enforcement mechanisms largely automated, and run by people such as are needed, who can be trusted because their lives are transparent too. Like the continuous front and machineguns did for WWI, offensive clandestine activity will become all but impossible. It's not that big a deal.
This is just a modernized re-write of that screed by Socrates, isn't it?
I guess it shouldn't surprise anyone that the "kids these days" essay remains so popular.
Quote from: Ideologue on September 03, 2013, 09:17:40 PM
Assuming the premise that loyalty is gone (true) and that secrecy is impossible, the solution for counterintelligence seems to naturally arise from the situation: transparency will become virtually total and enforcement mechanisms largely automated, and run by people such as are needed, who can be trusted because their lives are transparent too. Like the continuous front and machineguns did for WWI, offensive clandestine activity will become all but impossible. It's not that big a deal.
Somewhat disagree. The situation will require extensive decoy activities to hide the true clandestine activities (which may decline for the reasons you state), but communications advances will also make massive numbers of decoy activities easier to pull off.
This, this is the most beautiful thing I've ever read. Brings tears to my eyes. :weep:
Quote from: grumbler on September 04, 2013, 06:44:21 AM
This is just a modernized re-write of that screed by Socrates, isn't it?
I guess it shouldn't surprise anyone that the "kids these days" essay remains so popular.
Well the central point of his argument is true, at least in Spain. My parents worked all their lives for the same company. None of the people in my generation will be able to say that. We're in our thirties and have already switched employers (usually several times).
Quote from: Iormlund on September 04, 2013, 07:20:04 AM
Quote from: grumbler on September 04, 2013, 06:44:21 AM
This is just a modernized re-write of that screed by Socrates, isn't it?
I guess it shouldn't surprise anyone that the "kids these days" essay remains so popular.
Well the central point of his argument is true, at least in Spain. My parents worked all their lives for the same company. None of the people in my generation will be able to say that. We're in our thirties and have already switched employers (usually several times).
g also has a tendency to naysay anything that tries to generalize generational behavior.
grumbler does have more on the ground experience with cross-generational interaction than most here.
[Not intended as an age joke but just a reflection of the facts]
I hate Young People.
Quote from: Iormlund on September 04, 2013, 07:20:04 AM
Well the central point of his argument is true, at least in Spain. My parents worked all their lives for the same company. None of the people in my generation will be able to say that. We're in our thirties and have already switched employers (usually several times).
His conclusions may hold true for Spain, then. In the US, the idea of employment for life went out when the depression started. My great-grandparents, grandparents, parents, and myself have all had multiple employers.
The children of tomorrow will be the NSA`s biggest wet dream, not nightmare. Their entire lives logged and archived from childhood. Wonderful.
Quote from: garbon on September 04, 2013, 07:40:31 AM
g also has a tendency to naysay anything that tries to generalize generationalgroup behavior without any real evidence.
FYP. I also tend to naysay generalizations about behavior that are based on "race," sex, hair color, and star sign.
Quote from: garbon on September 04, 2013, 07:40:31 AM
Quote from: Iormlund on September 04, 2013, 07:20:04 AM
Quote from: grumbler on September 04, 2013, 06:44:21 AM
This is just a modernized re-write of that screed by Socrates, isn't it?
I guess it shouldn't surprise anyone that the "kids these days" essay remains so popular.
Well the central point of his argument is true, at least in Spain. My parents worked all their lives for the same company. None of the people in my generation will be able to say that. We're in our thirties and have already switched employers (usually several times).
g also has a tendency to naysay anything that tries to generalize generational behavior.
People of his age tend to be like that.
Quote from: grumbler on September 04, 2013, 10:07:00 AM
Quote from: Iormlund on September 04, 2013, 07:20:04 AM
Well the central point of his argument is true, at least in Spain. My parents worked all their lives for the same company. None of the people in my generation will be able to say that. We're in our thirties and have already switched employers (usually several times).
His conclusions may hold true for Spain, then. In the US, the idea of employment for life went out when the depression started. My great-grandparents, grandparents, parents, and myself have all had multiple employers.
I thought they worked for the government. Wait, were your parents spies for the Russians?
Quote from: grumbler on September 04, 2013, 10:11:27 AM
Quote from: garbon on September 04, 2013, 07:40:31 AM
g also has a tendency to naysay anything that tries to generalize generationalgroup behavior without any real evidence.
FYP. I also tend to naysay generalizations about behavior that are based on "race," sex, hair color, and star sign.
:mad:
My star sign tells me exactly who I am! We Sagitarians understand each other because we are exactly alike!
:P
Quote from: Tamas on September 04, 2013, 10:11:23 AM
The children of tomorrow will be the NSA`s biggest wet dream, not nightmare. Their entire lives logged and archived from childhood. Wonderful.
From a spy agency's perspective, the problem is that pretty well anyone can look into those logs and achives. What's the use of being a spy if stuff just isn't secret? ;)
I think there are some real organizational challenges for the alphabet soup guys having gone as "flexible" and contractor dependant as they apparently have. There are also a whole new set of challenges in the new "information environment" that comes with social networks, the internet, evolving expectations of privacy, the ubiquity of data and data-mining and so forth. Certainly, your Snowden or Manning type leaks and problems seem inevitable (especially in retrospect, natch).
I'm less fond of the penchant for analyzing these challenges in terms of letter prefixed generations and their perceived intrinsic qualities. I think that tends to obscure the real and interesting issues.
Quote from: grumbler on September 04, 2013, 10:11:27 AM
Quote from: garbon on September 04, 2013, 07:40:31 AM
g also has a tendency to naysay anything that tries to generalize generationalgroup behavior without any real evidence.
FYP. I also tend to naysay generalizations about behavior that are based on "race," sex, hair color, and star sign.
Spoken like a Scorpio.
Quote from: Peter Wiggin on September 04, 2013, 02:20:02 PM
Quote from: grumbler on September 04, 2013, 10:11:27 AM
Quote from: garbon on September 04, 2013, 07:40:31 AM
g also has a tendency to naysay anything that tries to generalize generationalgroup behavior without any real evidence.
FYP. I also tend to naysay generalizations about behavior that are based on "race," sex, hair color, and star sign.
Spoken like a Scorpio.
I'm a Scorpio! :w00t:
Generation Z? Where do we go from here? :(
Quote from: DGuller on September 04, 2013, 02:35:23 PM
Generation Z? Where do we go from here? :(
We can follow the layout in Excel. :)
Quote from: DGuller on September 04, 2013, 02:35:23 PM
Generation Z? Where do we go from here? :(
If we're using a base 36 numbering system, the next one will be generation 10.
Quote from: merithyn on September 04, 2013, 11:56:17 AM
Quote from: grumbler on September 04, 2013, 10:11:27 AM
Quote from: garbon on September 04, 2013, 07:40:31 AM
g also has a tendency to naysay anything that tries to generalize generationalgroup behavior without any real evidence.
FYP. I also tend to naysay generalizations about behavior that are based on "race," sex, hair color, and star sign.
:mad:
My star sign tells me exactly who I am! We Sagitarians understand each other because we are exactly alike!
:P
...
I'm also a Sagittarius. That's a flexible sign.
Quote from: grumbler on September 04, 2013, 10:07:00 AM
His conclusions may hold true for Spain, then. In the US, the idea of employment for life went out when the depression started. My great-grandparents, grandparents, parents, and myself have all had multiple employers.
Depends on where you worked, though. My dad was the typical old-school Company Man-- worked for the same company in the 60s, 70s, 80s, and early 90s. Then things caught up-- his employer offered him an 'early' retirement package which he accepted, and then proceeded to work for a competitor until he decided to fully retire on his own terms.
My current company (or at least my division/site) has a lot of people who have worked here for 30+ years. It was a cocoon of sorts in the modern age of employment and in some respects has remained so, even through a couple different mergers & acquisitions. The lady who runs our division started working here when she started college, continued on thereafter through her masters degree and then law degree, and was the last CEO we had before we got acquired.
Small to medium-sized banks have also been holdouts-- a few of them that are clients of mine still offer pensions and have employees that have been there for decades, doing pretty much the same thing every day :yucky:
Quote from: grumbler on September 04, 2013, 10:07:00 AM
Quote from: Iormlund on September 04, 2013, 07:20:04 AM
Well the central point of his argument is true, at least in Spain. My parents worked all their lives for the same company. None of the people in my generation will be able to say that. We're in our thirties and have already switched employers (usually several times).
His conclusions may hold true for Spain, then. In the US, the idea of employment for life went out when the depression started. My great-grandparents, grandparents, parents, and myself have all had multiple employers.
Look who is generalizing to the whole of the United States from the limited experiences of his own family. :P
Quote from: DGuller on September 04, 2013, 02:38:32 PM
Quote from: garbon on September 04, 2013, 02:36:46 PM
Quote from: DGuller on September 04, 2013, 02:35:23 PM
Generation Z? Where do we go from here? :(
We can follow the layout in Excel. :)
Generation AA?
I think my brother should join generation AA. He badly needs to get in touch with Bill W.
Quote from: Neil on September 04, 2013, 02:48:10 PM
Quote from: merithyn on September 04, 2013, 11:56:17 AM
Quote from: grumbler on September 04, 2013, 10:11:27 AM
Quote from: garbon on September 04, 2013, 07:40:31 AM
g also has a tendency to naysay anything that tries to generalize generationalgroup behavior without any real evidence.
FYP. I also tend to naysay generalizations about behavior that are based on "race," sex, hair color, and star sign.
:mad:
My star sign tells me exactly who I am! We Sagitarians understand each other because we are exactly alike!
:P
...
I'm also a Sagittarius. That's a flexible sign.
Are we pre-disposed to like Dreadnoughts though... :hmm:
[Sagittarius here too.]
Virgos recognize the austere power of aircraft.
Leo(Euro/American)/Dragon(Chinese).
As far as zodiacs and star signs go, I am: The Winner
Quote from: crazy canuck on September 04, 2013, 02:55:20 PM
Look who is generalizing to the whole of the United States from the limited experiences of his own family. :P
Look who doesn't understand how single examples disprove generalizations! I'd have thought, were you a real lawyer, that this would be a key understanding.
"You honor, I have proven that my client didn't sign the contract in question and request that claims against him based on it be dismissed."
"I object, your honor! Look who is generalizing to the whole of his client's guilt from the limited experience of this one contract."
Quote from: derspiess on September 04, 2013, 02:52:40 PM
Depends on where you worked, though. My dad was the typical old-school Company Man-- worked for the same company in the 60s, 70s, 80s, and early 90s. Then things caught up-- his employer offered him an 'early' retirement package which he accepted, and then proceeded to work for a competitor until he decided to fully retire on his own terms.
My current company (or at least my division/site) has a lot of people who have worked here for 30+ years. It was a cocoon of sorts in the modern age of employment and in some respects has remained so, even through a couple different mergers & acquisitions. The lady who runs our division started working here when she started college, continued on thereafter through her masters degree and then law degree, and was the last CEO we had before we got acquired.
Small to medium-sized banks have also been holdouts-- a few of them that are clients of mine still offer pensions and have employees that have been there for decades, doing pretty much the same thing every day :yucky:
Yes, that is my point: we experience history as individuals, not as "generations."
Quote from: grumbler on September 04, 2013, 06:04:17 PM
Quote from: crazy canuck on September 04, 2013, 02:55:20 PM
Look who is generalizing to the whole of the United States from the limited experiences of his own family. :P
Look who doesn't understand how single examples disprove generalizations!
Look at the idiot who doesnt understand that his one exception does not disprove a general rule. I thought you were a teacher who is charged with imparting critical thinking skills to his students?
The NSA is doomed anyways. President Rand Paul will defund them because George Washington didn't have an NSA.
The further we get from the generations which created the safe and secure world we live in the greater the hatred and disgust towards the legionaries which are holding off the barbarians at the gate.
If you are sufficiently self centered to ONLY look at the effect that the NSA might have on you then you are ignoring the big picture badly.
Quote from: crazy canuck on September 04, 2013, 06:13:34 PM
Look at the idiot who doesnt understand that his one exception does not disprove a general rule. I thought you were a teacher who is charged with imparting critical thinking skills to his students?
I am looking at the idiot (well, your avatar anyway), and wondering why you don't understand basic logic. A statement that isn't always valid is not a valid statement.
Quote from: grumbler on September 04, 2013, 06:04:17 PM
Quote from: crazy canuck on September 04, 2013, 02:55:20 PM
Look who is generalizing to the whole of the United States from the limited experiences of his own family. :P
Look who doesn't understand how single examples disprove generalizations! I'd have thought, were you a real lawyer, that this would be a key understanding.
"You honor, I have proven that my client didn't sign the contract in question and request that claims against him based on it be dismissed."
"I object, your honor! Look who is generalizing to the whole of his client's guilt from the limited experience of this one contract."
I thought we banned Martinus? :unsure:
Quote from: grumbler on September 05, 2013, 09:05:45 AM
Quote from: crazy canuck on September 04, 2013, 06:13:34 PM
Look at the idiot who doesnt understand that his one exception does not disprove a general rule. I thought you were a teacher who is charged with imparting critical thinking skills to his students?
I am looking at the idiot (well, your avatar anyway), and wondering why you don't understand basic logic. A statement that isn't always valid is not a valid statement.
Grumbler, I am deeply sorry that your great grandfather, your grandfather, your father and you couldnt hold a steady job. It explains a lot.
Quote from: Tonitrus on September 04, 2013, 05:21:07 PM
Leo(Euro/American)/Dragon(Chinese).
As far as zodiacs and star signs go, I am: The Winner
Certainly explains your career choice. :hmm:
I'm a Sagitarian Cock. :D I should have been an actress or a politician.
Libra/Fire Dragon (1976) here.
Quote from: crazy canuck on September 05, 2013, 09:12:26 AM
Grumbler, I am deeply sorry that your great grandfather, your grandfather, your father and you couldnt hold a steady job. It explains a lot.
Don't be sorry. It may well be the reason why I (and my forebears) don't make silly statements about logic, unlike those of you who are stuck in the first job you could get.
Quote from: grumbler on September 05, 2013, 10:40:30 AM
Quote from: crazy canuck on September 05, 2013, 09:12:26 AM
Grumbler, I am deeply sorry that your great grandfather, your grandfather, your father and you couldnt hold a steady job. It explains a lot.
Don't be sorry.
Ok
Quote from: Viking on September 04, 2013, 07:46:27 PM
The further we get from the generations which created the safe and secure world we live in the greater the hatred and disgust towards the legionaries which are holding off the barbarians at the gate.
If you are sufficiently self centered to ONLY look at the effect that the NSA might have on you then you are ignoring the big picture badly.
there is a fine line there, which crossed too much in either direction is very bad, I give you that much. But the NSA methods seem way over the top.
Every other day more comes out about the NSA. Today it was reported that the NSA has built computers and systems to crack into anyone's bank account, or any other personal encrypted site. The NSA has worked with software/security application vendors to create backdoors into some of the security systems that are used worldwide.
It was reported earlier that Snowden stole a lot more than feared and now the Russians, Chinese and whoever else now has access to all this info. Info on NSA techniques and methods, compromising so much.
This crap, plus all the rest that's come out, should make everyone crazy, nervous and damned pissed off.