I used to work for a webhosting company, and had similar experiences. We'd get requests for Men In Nice Suits to come in, rack up a nice non-descript 3u box -- this was a few years prior to this experience, so I'm certain that the tech's improved since then. As was described, the box just sat there, eating power, under orders Not To Touch Under Any Circumstances, until the federales came back in to take their box back.
Thinking back about it, again, this seems a lot of how the feds can keep things like this from getting out. The people that know are given the gag orders, the sysadmins racking and unracking know it's better for their careers, and their not staying out of jail, not to say that they have weird boxes on their network which have mirrored ports going to them. It's there, it's suspect, but the consequences for discussing a suspect box make it difficult to really discuss things.
I am so glad that I don't work under gag orders like that. It just doesn't seem ethical to be paid by a customer to spy on them. I understand why most would say nothing, but it must be so tempting to inform the customer.
It just seems very inefficient to store stuff on a hard drive for 9 months, no? If it's important enough to snoop, shouldn't you want to get the word out sooner?
Thinking back about it, again, this seems a lot of how the feds can keep things like this from getting out. The people that know are given the gag orders, the sysadmins racking and unracking know it's better for their careers, and their not staying out of jail, not to say that they have weird boxes on their network which have mirrored ports going to them. It's there, it's suspect, but the consequences for discussing a suspect box make it difficult to really discuss things.