Edward Snowden (or Eddy Snow) had to leave the USA and go into hiding after leaking classified information about global surveillance programs run by the NSA and other intelligence agencies[1][2]. He initially flew to Hong Kong and later traveled to Moscow, where he sought asylum in various countries but was eventually granted temporary asylum in Russia[3][4]. Snowden is currently living in Russia, where he supports himself through speaking fees, earning income from public speaking engagements about cybersecurity and surveillance[3][4]. He has stated that he does not receive any financial support from the Russian government and lives independently[3][4]. Snowden’s actions as a whistleblower led to changes in laws governing intelligence agencies and technology companies regarding privacy and security standards[3].
Citations: [1] Edward Snowden - Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Snowden [2] Edward Snowden: the whistleblower behind the NSA surveillance revelations https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jun/09/edward-snowden-nsa-whistleblower-surveillance [3] Edward Snowden Speaks Out: ‘I Haven’t And I Won’t’ Cooperate With Russia https://www.npr.org/2019/09/19/761918152/exiled-nsa-contractor-edward-snowden-i-haven-t-and-i-won-t-cooperate-with-russia [4] Edward Snowden asylum in Russia - Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Edward_Snowden_asylum_in_Russia [5] Edward Snowden Revealed As Key Participant In Mysterious Ceremony … https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaeldelcastillo/2022/04/27/edward-snowden-revealed-as-key-participant-in-mysterious-ceremony-creating-2-billion-anonymous-cryptocurrency/?sh=6f6648723b24
He’s in Russia now being used as a propaganda mouthpiece against the West, that’s how he survives, by doing whatever Russian intel tells him to do.
This isn’t totally a knock against him, he was caught between a rock and a hard place, and chose the “be used by dictators” route, rather than the “definitely go to prison for a while” route.
We just need better whistleblower protections and oversight here in the states, but if anything the spying on us has gotten worse since Snowden, while also still allowing for Internet Nazis to spread like a cancer with almost no pushback.
Your 1st paragraph, do you have actual proof of that? Serious question.
I think it makes sense given the situation, and would be completely unsurprising since it’s Russia and they torture people. And his wife and child (multiple kids now?) are there with him. In his case I’d just do exactly as told out of fear.
But just curious if there’s any tangible evidence of this or anything he’s doing over there.
This blog post is kind of biased but it has good links to some of the articles about the times that Snowden has “toed the party line” for Putin’s regime. So mamy articles coming up in those useless garbage we now call search engines just pull up where Snowden has sworn an oath to Russia and has been given citizenship so therefore he’s eligible to go fight Ukraine now, rather than things more related to my search.
I’d say this is more than kinda biased, and is heavily biased. They link to a 2015 article that says only 2% of documents have been publicly disclosed through journalists, and then make the claim that Russia and China have the other 98% with no source at all for the claim.
I might be misremembering the timeline in Citizen Four, but I remember that he had given the journalists all the documents and made a point that he didn’t have access to anything before leaving for Latin America.
It’s unfortunate that Snowden’s passport was revoked while he was in the Moscow Airport, and that he’s stuck there now. For a guy who didn’t want to go to jail or be executed for speaking out against the government, I don’t blame him for not speaking up against Putin.
There’s enough anecdotal to be highly suspect. Changes in his message and tone over the years. Unbidden declarations that he’s not being paid or directed by Russia. I can’t say he’s saying much out of character these days though.
Remember friends:
the enemies of your enemy may feign to be your friend, but their only intent is to hurt their enemy not be your friend^ this is why Snowden is where he is, he picked poorly HOWEVER he likely had little choice.
He leaked a ton of gov’t documents. Some on domestic spying things that had been known about for some time. This was a good thing. He also leaked a bunch of stuff about U.S. international spying. That was not good. He might have gotten away with leaking domestic stuff. Or lightly gotten away, who knows. But he was without a doubt going to jail for leaking international intel. And rightfully so. As said, he ran away to Russia instead of face the music. If you can’t do the time, don’t do the crime.
As a non-American, I’m rather happy he leaked things about U.S. international spying. That was good.
Whether or not you think that information should be out there, protecting national security secrets was quite literally his job. Penalties for mishandling national security information are pretty clear, especially when you’ve been put into a position of trust. He then flees to one of America’s biggest enemies on the international stage. And do we really think that protection came without a price?
Honestly I have real mixed feelings about Snowden. I do think Americans had a right to know about the domestic spying activities even if they weren’t entirely surprising (details had been leaked previously but we did not know the degree to which those efforts had been ramped up). But he openly and knowingly violated the law. He can’t have expected that to come without consequences. And he can’t fall back on principles if he’s not willing to face those consequences.
Sure, he risked his life and safety to get the information out,. That makes him a hero.
As for breaking the law, he did his duty as a human and thats more important than upholding injustice.
No one should have to “face the consequences” of authoritarians.
Who exactly are you referring to as an authoritarian? The Obama administration?
The US government as a whole.
That sure seems like stretching the definition of that word to the point where it’s meaningless.
You think applying authoritarianism to a government as a whole is stretching the definition to being meaningless?
Alrighty then.
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Yep. Every time I bring up the objectively bad parts of the leaks, people just flip out.
What parts are objectively bad? see a lot that’s subjectively bad for the US, but plenty of other people are glad to know that they had been spied on and plenty of other countries are happy to have the US lose some significant pr points.
My memory is fuzzy. Didn’t he originally try to give the full, un-redacted docs to just newspapers, but got frustrated with the slowness/unresponsiveness or something and then everything went public? Or am I thinking of the earlier guy who worked on writing illegal software for the government, tried to blow the whistle and then got in trouble? Or am I thinking of a subsequent whistleblower who tried to use a secure dropbox for media, but it turned out to be insecure? There’s just been so many people trying to show proof of shady government stuff that I can’t keep track of which of the folks are supposed to be ‘bad’ for doing so.
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