With the interesting revelation of private fiber being tapped, I'd expect more companies to start encrypting if they haven't already. Google was sending information over unsecured circuits without encryption.
I'd expect Microsoft and others will make an announcement. With MS's overly zealous security handling these days, I'd be slightly surprised to find out that they were transmitting in the clear outside their datacenter.
If there were actual taps _inside_ the datacenters, like on top of racks and so on, that'd be quite the spectacle.
When the message is basically "the government is collecting your emails" I am skeptical that the public would get that much more mad at a technical distinction like this. If there has not been an actionable backlash yet, what really could cause it? I am thinking that the leaks need to be something along the lines of "Kate Johnson of Columbus Ohio (made up name) had her explicit text message viewed by her ex husband, an NSA analyst, on N occasions." We have not had a leak that hits home yet for everyday people (non-tech non-world-leader).
"In one 2004 case, a civilian employee told NSA security that she had spied on a foreign phone number because she found it on her husband's cell phone and suspected he was being unfaithful."
I'd expect Microsoft and others will make an announcement. With MS's overly zealous security handling these days, I'd be slightly surprised to find out that they were transmitting in the clear outside their datacenter.
If there were actual taps _inside_ the datacenters, like on top of racks and so on, that'd be quite the spectacle.