Essentially complete metadata is required for outsourced billing. AMDOCS openly acknowledges that they provide outsourced billing to a slew of major telcos across the world. Many of us have experience that this even occurs outside of the physical premises of the telco ("hosted billing"). That much I know to be true, but you are welcome to draw your own conclusions or remain skeptical.
The NSA interception thing is an additional concern, but given the European Parliament report in to Echelon from 2001, William Binney's recent reports from within the upper management of the NSA, the magnitude of their (black) budget, recent confirmatory comments by other LE parties, and the sheer magnitude of independently verifiable NSA construction projects in progress, it must be difficult to maintain much skepticism there.
The NSA interception thing is an additional concern, but given the European Parliament report in to Echelon from 2001, William Binney's recent reports from within the upper management of the NSA, the magnitude of their (black) budget, recent confirmatory comments by other LE parties, and the sheer magnitude of independently verifiable NSA construction projects in progress, it must be difficult to maintain much skepticism there.