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These [NSA] programs were never about terrorism: they're about economic spying, social control, and diplomatic manipulation. They're about power.
Edward Snowden
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Edward Snowden
Age: 41
Born: 1983
Born: June 21
Computer Scientist
Dissident
Intelligence Analyst
Intelligence Officer
Security Guard
System Administrator
Whistleblower
Elizabeth City
North Carolina
Edward Joseph Snowden
Ed Snowden
Never
Manipulation
Programs
Terrorism
Program
Control
Economic
Spying
Social
Nsa
Power
Diplomatic
More quotes by Edward Snowden
We have to call mass surveillance mass surveillance. We can't let governments around the world redefine, and sort of weasel their way out of it by saying this is bulk collection.
Edward Snowden
People would publish their websites other people would read them. But there was no real back and forth other than through e-mail. Web 2.0 was what they called the collaborative web - Facebook, Twitter, the social media.
Edward Snowden
I'm not a communist, a socialist or a radical. But these issues have to be addressed.
Edward Snowden
If I and other whistleblowers are sentenced to long years in prison without so much as a chance to explain our motivations to a jury, it will have a deeply chilling effect on future whistleblowers working as I did to expose government abuse and overreach. It will chill speech. It will corrode the quality of our democracy.
Edward Snowden
I don't care if I end up in jail or Guantánamo or whatever, kicked out of a plane with two gunshots in the face. I did what I did because I believe it is the right thing to do, and I will continue to do that.
Edward Snowden
The question is: Particularly in the post-9/11 era, are societies becoming more liberal or more authoritarian?
Edward Snowden
We have got a CIA station just up the road – the consulate here in Hong Kong – and I am sure they are going to be busy for the next week. And that is a concern I will live with for the rest of my life, however long that happens to be.
Edward Snowden
It's critical how we want to use these spy programs, these electronic capabilities, where we want to draw the line, and who should approve these programs, these decisions, and at what level, for engaging in operations that could lead us as a nation into a war.
Edward Snowden
We need the security standards to apply to the internet. We need to be able to trust that when we send our emails through Verizon, that Verizon isn't sharing with the NSA, that Verizon isn't sharing them with the FBI or German intelligence or French intelligence or Russian intelligence or Chinese intelligence.
Edward Snowden
Before 2013, if you said the NSA was making records of everybody's phone calls and the [Government Communications Headquarters] was monitoring lawyers and journalists, people raised eyebrows and called you a conspiracy theorist. Those days are over.
Edward Snowden
The chairs [in Congress] are part of the Gang of Eight. They get briefed on every covert-action program and everything like that. They know where all the bodies are buried. At the same time, they get far more campaign donations than anybody else from defense contractors, from intelligence corporations, from private military companies.
Edward Snowden
There are times throughout history and it doesn't take long for either an American or a German, to think about times in the history of their country where the law provided the Government to do things which were not right.
Edward Snowden
I told the government I'd volunteer for prison, as long as it served the right purpose.
Edward Snowden
I took what I knew to the public, so what affects all of us can be discussed by all of us in the light of day, and I asked the world for justice.
Edward Snowden
The consent of the governed is not consent if it is not informed.
Edward Snowden
The internet exchange is sort of the core points where all of the international cables come together, where all of the internet service providers come together, and they trade lines with each other. These are priority one targets for any sort of espionage agency, because they provide access to so many people's communications.
Edward Snowden
I will be satisfied if the federation of secret law, unequal pardon and irresistible executive powers that rule the world that I love are revealed even for an instant.
Edward Snowden
Hong Kong has a reputation for freedom in spite of the People's Republic of China. It has a strong tradition of free speech.
Edward Snowden
There was a real choice when [Barack Obama] became president. It was a very difficult choice - to say, We're not going to hold senior officials to account with the same laws that every other citizen in the country is held to, or This is a nation that believes in the rule of law.
Edward Snowden
Too often we forget that social and political movements don't happen overnight. They don't bring change immediately - you have to build a critical mass of understanding of the issues.
Edward Snowden
