The NSA's charter is to monitor foreign communications and intelligence, so yes, the whole point of what they're doing is because the internet exists outside of the US.

Yes, you know that the Internet that exists outside the US is connected to the US, right?

Which belies one of the most insidious parts of Stellar Wind... that the NSA could've just tapped the cables which link the US to other countries, but they chose to spy directly on US citizens as well.

Are you sure ? I thought they had only minitel.

Yeah, but they've got their claws in down here with their ping-pong ball monitoring centre in Waihopai. Echelon, we in whether we like it or not - New Zealand is the lapdog I'm part of. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECHELON