Shortly after 9/11, certain Level 3 employees received security clearance. It was evident who received the clearance as their employee badges were different than everyone else. Gossip was the gov't installed taps (fiber& router) within the network.
Level 3 was the largest capitalized start up in history at the time. Peter Kiewit & Sons(PKS) was the principal investor ponying up over $2B. If you see construction sites that have orange trucks with black hoods this is PKS.
Walter Scott Jr was the Chairman of PKS. He and Warren Buffett are besties!
Prior to CenturyLink purchasing Level 3, Level 3 carried over 50% of GLOBAL Internet traffic.
Think about this… If the gov tapped the fiber to collect info on a specific individual, they would have to capture all of the traffic on that fiber cable (gigabits at a time). Does this leave open the possibility of incidental collections happening to non-targeted individuals whose info crossed that fiber?
Today's VoIP network (phone network) was patented by Level 3. The term SoftSwitch was coined by them. The network is the voice switch. It is a globally distributed voice switch.
Level 3 somehow being involved in this sounds completely logical.
PKS is smart. Perhaps they dumped Level 3 to minimize their risk related to what's coming out. They go by the motto, "protect the downside, and the upside will take care of itself."