"It will be alleged that Snowden does not understand the secret programs on which he blew the whistle."
Isn't this true, though? It appears that all the information from the internet companies came from court orders for specific information that were reviewed by the companies' lawyers.
Isn't this true, though? It appears that all the information from the internet companies came from court orders for specific information that were reviewed by the companies' lawyers.
The simple truth is, we don't know. And that's basically the point, as I see it. The NSA (and their sister organizations like the CIA, FBI, etc.) operate under cloak of darkness and shadow, and hide behind a veil of secrecy to an extent that makes it all but impossible to have an informed conversation about any of this. And that is, IMO, incompatible with a free, open, democratic society. Regardless of what Snowden knew, or thought he knew, or didn't know, he threw a dash of light on just enough of this secrecy to at least start the conversation and subject it to some real scrutiny.
In that regard, no matter what happens next, he has already won. That said, it will be a shame if all this debate doesn't lead to some actual long-term change.
This particular attack completed by Jeffery Toobin in the New Yorker on Monday 6/10:
"What, one wonders, did Snowden think the N.S.A. did? Any marginally attentive citizen, much less N.S.A. employee or contractor, knows that the entire mission of the agency is to intercept electronic communications. Perhaps he thought that the N.S.A. operated only outside the United States; in that case, he hadn’t been paying very close attention."
No, Toobin says nothing about Snowden's factually accuracy, which is what I'm talking about.
Snowden said "I, sitting at my desk, certainly had the authorities to wiretap anyone, from you, or your accountant, to a federal judge, to even the President if I had a personal email." The initial articles from the Washington Post and Guardian implied that the NSA can browse, at will, all data about everyone on the servers of those internet companies.
The government says the information requests must be certified to fit the scope of 50 USC Chapter 36[1], then be approved by the FISA courts, then sent to the companies, where their lawyers review the court orders and then specific data is produced in response to the narrow requirements.
There's a huge gap between these two stories.
I'm not 100% sure that Snowden is wrong, but I'm leaning that way based on what I've learned in the past week.
P.S.: I am also not saying that what the government is doing is Constitutional or moral or even, necessarily, legal. I object in particular to the telephone metadata collection, which is separate from the so-called PRISM data collection.
The problem with your argument is that the NSA documents themselves describe their system as providing "direct access". And no-one who has seen the unreleased materials has argued that this mischaracterizes the system.
It does not seem possible for a system with effective checks and balances to be reasonably described as providing "direct access" to private email correspondence. Which leads to an alarming observation: if we assume there is nothing else happening (MITM interception, access to private keys, etc.) then either the FISA system has been automated to the point it offers no reasonable check against abuses of power, or the NSA is confused about its own capabilities and is fundamentally incompetent.
Which interpretation do you prefer given the role, power and relative freedom from democratic oversight entrusted to the organization?
You've only seen 4 slides of 36 total. People who have seen the entire spreadsheet have stated that there is a lot of technical information (how data is gathered and reconstructed) that has yet to be published.
Snowden send 41 slides, only 5 have been released. The only 2 people ( Glenn Greenwald and Barton Gellman) that have the rest have no intention of releasing them.
Isn't this true, though? It appears that all the information from the internet companies came from court orders for specific information that were reviewed by the companies' lawyers.