The more hotly debated program is one in which the NSA maps the origin and destination of US citizens’ telephone traffic and stores it for possible later inspection (presumably with a court order). This application of technological capacity to store what is called “big data” raises a new set of issues about intrusion into citizens’ privacy.
斯诺登披露了美国国内的两个重大监控项目。从公民自由角度讲，检查可疑非美国来源的信息的内容比较不容易引起争议。在争论较激烈的项目中，国安局勾画出美国公民电话通信的来源地和目的地地图，予以存档以供未来的可能调查之用（也许需要法院调令）。利用技术能力存储所谓的“大数据”带来了一组关于侵入公民隐私的新问题。