Leaving aside the civil liberties aspect of this program, it is hard to believe that it will be cost effective. For one thing, there is an awful lot to listen to. Who is going to monitor it? Do we have the staff to do it? I doubt it. (The KGB’s wiretapping far outstripped its ability to do anything with it.) For another, much of it will be in a wide variety of foreign languages. The language of each conversation will have to be identified and passed to a monitor who understands that language. Again, do we have the staff to do this? The US National Security Agency does this kind of thing, but I doubt that we have either the technology or the budget for the enormous computing power required. Finally, even if we make the large investment in people, machines, and technology needed to do this effectively, how much are we going to learn? Sure, we’ll pick up someone asking his wife if she hid the salami carefully, but how likely is it that professional smugglers, spies, and terrorists are going to give themselves away this way? It is very unlikely that this will catch anything but minor smuggling.

This is a fine example of the police state our government is building around us. Well said Billposer in your comments relating to the value of the information gained for the cost of trying to get that information. This is what happens when we have a group think government with no checks and balances.