What they are gathering isn't conversations, but more the forensics, or metadata, dates & times, connections made... At least from what I read. Actual conversations likely would overwhelm the system, but I recall them talking of key word analysis, like they do on web monitoring. My guess is that it's been going on, but only in the last decade has collection methods improved. Ma Bell's been in the game longer than anyone, Verizon, when I worked there was like stepping back 20 years... So maybe it's taken this long for their technology on wired lines to become useful. Cellular, they've been ahead technically, but maybe weren't willing to play as readily as at&t... That leaves all the other carriers out, Sprint, etc..
We'll likely never know what they're looking for, specifically..
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