The NSA is a very controversial organization, especially within the past couple of years dealing with the recent terrorist attacks, so what I questioned is what can they truly do? What is their role as a government organization? According to NSA.gov, the official website of the extremely powerful organization, and there are a superfluous amount of specific roles and tasks they carry out on a daily basis. The NSA has many defined roles, but in certain situations, there is a very fuzzy grey area where their true role is put into question. The government institutions are very powerful and can abuse their power, which can make the public feel insecure about what the government is doing to try and “protect” the citizens. However, they play a critical role in keeping citizens safe from "bad actors."
The NSA, according to their website in their mission and strategy section, believes in “Honesty, Respect for the Law, Integrity, and Transparency.” They state “we strive at all times to be deserving of that trust”, which, to me, is slightly ironic due to the fact that they monitor citizens’ browsing patterns and try to access information that they don’t have the right to view. This is destroying the trust that they “strive” to conserve with the public. Another claim of theirs is that “U.S. laws and regulations that govern [their] activities” and that is also another confusing aspect of their mission statement because that creates the grey area that many are concerned about. Many laws create grey areas simply due to the fact that there are loopholes in everything. There is always something that isn’t stated clearly enough in the actual law that not only citizens but also government institutions argue their way around it.
On the other hand, it is the NSA’s job to make sure that the cyber network is a place where we all feel comfortable using and they need to ensure that no one is going to abuse people’s trust within certain networks, or even create a threat to the national government. As explained in their “Understanding the Threat” section of their website, “Our information networks and technology are constantly at risk from a variety of bad actors using a multitude of techniques.” The fact that there is a government institution dedicated to ensuring our cyber safety allows many people to feel a little safer, knowing that there is a lot lesser of a chance that their information will be stolen and used for harm. Although many times the NSA is criticized for violating people’s privacy, they are there to provide a safe environment for us to live online in.
Future Research Questions:
Future Research Questions:
- What part of the government is the NSA under?
- How is the NSA directed/ordered?
- How much funding does government protective agencies receive?
- How are the main figures of the NSA?
- What are some past controversial events?
