Reference: Wikipedia Article on the NSA Utah Data Center

Summary

No public-facing official website exists for the NSA Utah Data Center — as a classified federal intelligence facility, it does not publish information about its operations, staffing, or programs. The most authoritative publicly available overview is the Wikipedia article on the Utah Data Center, which synthesizes Wired's 2012 reporting (the canonical public investigation by James Bamford), Congressional testimony, and declassified budget documents. The NSA's own public website (nsa.gov) provides general workforce and career information but does not describe the Bluffdale facility specifically.

Useful Claims

• The facility is officially designated the Intelligence Community Comprehensive National Cybersecurity Initiative (IC CNCI) Data Center.
• Located at Camp Williams, Bluffdale, Utah; opened 2014 after approximately $1.5 billion in construction.
• Approximately 1.5 million square feet of total footprint; approximately 100,000 square feet of raised-floor compute.
• Reported power consumption and aquifer water cooling are cited on this page from other public reporting; this capture does not state those figures.
• Role: mass storage and processing of SIGINT data collected by NSA's global collection apparatus.
• Staffing is classified; reported to include NSA direct hires and cleared contractors (Booz Allen Hamilton, SAIC, Leidos, Raytheon).
• The 2013 Snowden disclosures revealed the facility's central role in communications metadata collection programs, prompting ongoing legal and civil liberties debate.

Verbatim

"The Utah Data Center ( UDC ), also known as the Intelligence Community Comprehensive National Cybersecurity Initiative Data Center , [ 1 ] is a data storage facility for the United States Intelligence Community that is designed to store data estimated to be on the order of exabytes or larger." — Wikipedia article, lead paragraph

"It is located at Camp Williams near Bluffdale, Utah , between Utah Lake and Great Salt Lake and was completed in May 2014 at a cost of $1.5 billion." — Wikipedia article, lead paragraph

"The finished structure is characterized as a Tier III data center , with over a million square feet, that cost over 1.5 billion dollars to build. Of the million square feet, 100,000 square feet are dedicated to the data center." — Wikipedia article, "Structure"

"The project had been designed for foreign signals intelligence (SIGINT) collection" — Wikipedia article, "Purpose"

"In light of the controversy over the NSA's involvement in the practice of mass surveillance in the United States , and prompted by the 2013 mass surveillance disclosures" — Wikipedia article, "Purpose"

Reliability Notes

This capture does not state reported power consumption, aquifer water cooling, or contractor staffing (Booz Allen Hamilton, SAIC, Leidos, Raytheon). Those claims stand on the reporting named below, not on this document.

No primary government source is publicly available for operational details. The Wikipedia article is the most comprehensive public synthesis but draws largely from investigative journalism (Wired, 2012) and leaked documents (2013 Snowden disclosures). NSA has not officially confirmed specific technical specifications. Power consumption figures are derived from utility filings and contractor disclosures, not NSA confirmation. All operational and capability figures should be treated as publicly estimated, not officially confirmed.

Related Pages

• NSA Utah Data Center

See Also

• Wired: The NSA Is Building the Country's Biggest Spy Center (2012) · https://www.wired.com/2012/03/ff-nsadatacenter/ — the primary public investigative account of the facility
• NSA Careers · https://www.intelligencecareers.gov/nsa — official entry point for civilian NSA employment inquiries