Turbulence (NSA)

Turbulence is a National Security Agency Information Technology project started circa 2005. It was developed in small, inexpensive "test" pieces rather than one grand plan like its failed predecessor, the Trailblazer Project. It also includes offensive cyber-warfare capabilities, like injecting malware into remote computers. Congress criticized Turbulence in 2007 for having similar bureaucratic problems as Trailblazer.

According to Siobhan Gorman in a 2007 Baltimore Sun article, "The conclusion in Congress, two former government officials said, was that Turbulence was over budget, not delivering and poorly led, and that there was little or no strategy to pull it all together."

The Trailblazer Project had been cancelled in the mid-2000s after a Congressional investigation and Department of Defense Inspector General report found it overbudget, wasteful, and ineffective. One of the Trailblazer whistleblowers who helped with the DoD Inspector General report, Thomas Andrews Drake, was later charged with the Espionage Act of 1917 for allegedly retaining 5 documents in his home. Two of those documents were about Turbulence; his defense points out that one of these documents is clearly marked "UNCLASSIFIED" and the other was declassified shortly after his indictment.