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The consent of the governed is not consent if it is not informed.

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
Governed
Informed
Consent

More quotes by Edward Snowden

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One journalist said that everybody in Russia is miserable. Russia is a terrible place. And I'm going to end up miserable and I'm going to be a drunk and I'm never going to do anything. I don't drink. I've never been drunk in my life. And they talk about Russia like it's the worst place on earth. Russia's great.
Edward Snowden
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The public don't want to authorize the internet to become a battleground. We need to do everything we can as a society to keep that a neutral zone, to keep that an economic zone that can reflect our values, both politically, socially, and economically.
Edward Snowden
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The majority of people in developed countries spend at least some time interacting with the Internet, and Governments are abusing that necessity in secret to extend their powers beyond what is necessary and appropriate.
Edward Snowden
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I talk to people in the ACLU office in New York all the time. I'm able to participate in the debate and to campaign for reform. I'm just the first to come forward in the manner that I did and succeed.
Edward Snowden
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Because, remember, I didn't want to change society. I wanted to give society a chance to determine if it should change itself.
Edward Snowden
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The [George W.] Bush administration marked a very serious and profoundly negative turning point - not just for the nation, but for the international order, because we started to govern on the idea of might makes right. And that's a very old, toxic and infectious idea.
Edward Snowden
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I'm not an anarchist. I'm not saying, Burn it to the ground.
Edward Snowden
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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
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I don't think I have committed a crime outside the domain of the US.
Edward Snowden
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I have been a systems engineer, systems administrator, a senior adviser for the Central Intelligence Agency, a solutions consultant and a telecommunications information systems officer.
Edward Snowden
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When it is made to appear as though not knowing everything about everyone is an existential crisis, then you feel that bending the rules is okay. Once people hate you for bending those rules, breaking them becomes a matter of survival.
Edward Snowden
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All I wanted was for the public to be able to have a say in how they are governed. That is a milestone we left a long time ago.
Edward Snowden
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If I am traitor, who did I betray? I gave all my information to the American public, to American journalists who are reporting on American issues. If they see that as treason, I think people really need to consider who they think they're working for. The public is supposed to be their boss, not their enemy.
Edward Snowden
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We have seen enough criminality on the part of government. It is hypocritical to make this allegation against me. They have narrowed the public sphere of influence.
Edward Snowden
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Internet exchanges and internet service providers - international fiber optic landing points - these are the key tools that governments go after in order to enable their programs of mass surveillance. If they want to be able to watch the entire population of a country instead of a single individual, you have to go after those bulk interchanges.
Edward Snowden
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Ending mass surveillance of private phone calls under the Patriot Act is a historic victory for the rights of every citizen. Yet while we have reformed this one program, many others remain.
Edward Snowden
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We hack everyone everywhere. We like to make a distinction between us and the others. But we are in almost every country in the world. We are not at war with these countries.
Edward Snowden
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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
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We have to argue forcefully and demand that the government recognise that these programmes do not prevent - mass surveillance does not prevent acts of terrorism.
Edward Snowden
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So when they say I'm a low-level systems administrator, that I don't know what I'm talking about, I'd say it's somewhat misleading.
Edward Snowden