My guess is they aren't far ahead which explains why they are constantly telling companies to not encrypt data. The reality is they've spend billions developing a "super weapon" of mass surveillance and that entire system is heavily reliant on people not using effective encryption and companies willingly handing over data or creating backdoors.
I agree, this is the simplest and most likely explanation. As tempting as it is to buy into the romantic idea that they’re 100 years ahead of everyone else but can only use their powers in extreme circumstances, that just seems very unlikely.
The funny thing is even if they did have that they would still be as useless for their claimed function given the sheer haystack of communication and simple opsec and signals making it impossible to decode from the context.
A terrorist saying "Say hello to grandma for me." Could mean cancel/start/delay the attack or it might mean exactly what it says.
