Or they managed to fill it with hardware without having to coordinate an intricate conspiracy involving supply chain and manufacturers across the globe.
Nobody is alleging that but you. Personally I don't think either "surveillance system needs a way to store what is collected" or "high-volume customers have economic leverage to demand confidentiality" are particularly intricate concepts.
Colordrops said, "The Thailand story was a cover." This is the allegation. Not that the NSA bought a lot of drives and kept it secret, but that this purchase alone rather than the floods were responsible for the drive storage, and the flood story was fabricated. That is the alleged conspiracy.
I find that a number of conspiracy theories are 'debunked' by creating an obviously ridiculous strawman/rendition of the theory that nobody actually claimed.
The Snowden effect has worn off, it seems. Nowadays the NSA is back to being able to pull the most extreme stunts and everyone who thinks it is even remotely possible is called a crazy conspiracy theorist.
To claim that the NSA caused or faked the Thailand flooding is conspiracy theorist bullshit of the highest order.
To claim that the NSA took advantage of an existing event to help their already-planned ordering fly under the radar more easily is perfectly plausible. And, honestly, pretty boring.
Which one are you alleging? Choosing your words carefully might be wise.
The NSA has no shortage of front companies to do such jobs. For instance, when the CIA needed to place torture experts in Brazil so they better could support the Brazilian military dictatorship, companies like Ford and Coca Cola were more than happy to offer them management jobs.
