Ex-CIA man says exposed U.S. spy scheme for better world
 

A former CIA employee working as a contractor at the U.S. National Security Agency said he was the man who had leaked details of a top secret U.S. surveillance programme, acting out of conscience to protect "basic liberties for people around the world."

Holed up in a hotel room in Hong Kong, Edward Snowden, 29, said he had thought long and hard before publicising details of an NSA programme code named PRISM, saying he had done so because he felt his country was building an unaccountable and secret espionage machine that spied on every American.

The CIA declined to comment.

Both the Washington Post and Britain's Guardian newspaper - to whom he gave the documents he had purloined - published Snowden's identity on Sunday after he sought to be identified.

"I don't want to live in a society that does these sort of things ... I do not want to live in a world where everything I do and say is recorded. That is not something I am willing to support or live under," he told the Guardian, which published a video interview with him on its website.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/...0EL0PQ20130609

...he said, from China.

LOL. He is so fucking dead.

He pretty much said as much himself in his interview, something to the attune of "You can't expose something this big about people this powerful without expecting serious repercussions, if they want to find you it's only a matter of time before they do"

He shouldn't have bothered putting his neck on the line for a few days of headlines, anyone who followed the news after 9/11 knew this was happening. Most people in the US & UK don't give a shit, they'll forget all about it in a day or two and continue to share everything about their lives through Facebook, Twitter & Google anyway. :Oh crap

YUP:2 cents:

He is the hero in the media so US government will be unhappy if someone (else) kills him as everyone will think he was killed by the US government. I think he will be protected - even if, possibly, inside a jail for life.

He'll just disappear a few years down the road.

This is what I don't get - why take such risks to expose information that was already known by those who read about such things.

Did he just want his name in the newspaper or something?

Yep. And he'll be long forgotten by then and no one will even notice.

The spineless losers projecting their fear of death are pathetic and viscerally disgusting to me.

i guess i'm out of the loop, i was not aware of a top secret project code named prism, until this fellow revealed it.

i think i know what you are saying but i think you are stretching things a lot.

Who knows, perhaps he had already been burnt for another reason or is already on a hitlist and had nothing to lose, a bit like Benazir Bhutto

The fact he's in China suggests he may be a double agent, just a thought :)

This stuff happens all the time with whistleblowers, anyone remember Alexander Litvinenko killed by the KGB for exposing some of Russia's dark secrets

I suppose I was a bit too vague with my post, what I meant was that after 9/11 the UK & US passed new laws where ISPs had to install black boxes on their servers and keep a record of everything for (I think it was 5 years)

So basically any intelligence agency had access to all this information anyway, it's just with this project PRISM it's taken it to a whole new level because it makes it so much easier for them to get direct access to the info they want or need.

I mean these laws where passed before Facebook, Gmail, Twitter existed - You know back when people still actually gave a shit about their privacy, when people where up in arms about Government proposed National ID cards etc around 2003 - 2005

:1orglaugh No shit . . . . the irony is thick

For conspiracy theorists: bitcoin price dropped 17% after being stable for ages:

http://bitcoinity.org/markets/image?span=7d&size=medium

Perhaps learning of prism, some big guys feared govt would find more of who owns or buy what with bitcoins. Or perhaps, it's aliens.

Don't sound so happy/proud?

i don't recall any black boxes being required by law to be installed on isp's after 9/11.

i do recall there was the surveliance act, they were monitoring foreign phone calls. then later there was the warrantless wiretapping, which consequential issues led to the end of that program.


i think we are on the same page though eh, this is a whole nother lever. people need to be all atwitter about this. obama is already on the defensive about it.

Son of a bitch... This fucker dropped out of high school, got his GED, did not graduate from college, and had a comfy $200k a year job with a defense contractor...

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/n...rview/2405873/

But this was the best part...

If you're good with computers, the fuck you need a degree for? 9/10 times I would hire the self taught programmer over someone who learned at school.

And if I was him I'd be paranoid too.. You should be especially paranoid at his actions, since he has first hand info on what technologies they're actually using these days to eavesdrop and such.

They said they can understand conversations by pointing a device at a glass pane window and reading the vibrations from a distance.... That's some scary shit.

I know you think you have "nothing to hide" but there are those of us who enjoy a bit of privacy.

Put it this way.. What if it wasn't the "government" listening to your calls, reading your e-mails etc.. But say Los Zetas? Then would you be worried?

Sorry my mistake, this law came out in the UK before 9/11

Regulation Of Investigatory Powers Act 2000

Also more good into about it here

Yes we are on the same page! It's absolutely terrifying if you sit and think about the wide spread implications down the line if our governments become more authoritarian.

No need for a trial if you've been accused or doing something wrong, all laid out infront of you in black and white :Oh crap

Also a great way to blackmail/manipulate people in the future if there is anything they've ever looked at or regretted doing online.

Sadly privacy is a thing of the past, just wait until Google glasses take off. Social trends are powerful things, governments have no need to force people to do things anymore when they can socially engineer them into doing what they want.

In 10 years time it won't surprise me if a big percentage of people are permanently wearing some form of augmented reality glasses whether it's Google or some other company and then every single thing you say or do will be recorded.

The crazy thing is, this guy sounds like some deranged Tinfoil hat wearing motherfucker!

But this guy is an authority on the subject as you've mentioned because he's seen first hand what they are capable of doing!

they will kill him just to prove their point :)

I find the whole thing totally ridiculous - I really dont care if the govt want to snoop on the bad guys.

I find the power of google et al a lot more worrying. Google is snooping and logging everything you do in display more ads and sell you more useless shit. Apple are turning into the thought police with their neo-con attitudes to naked women.

These corps are now so powerful that they can operate with a global footprint, domiciled nowhere, paying virtually zero corp tax, unregulated, more powerful than any government.

At this moment these digital mega corps make the CIA look like amateurs, they make fools of our tax authorities, and they hold more data about your lives than you could ever imagine.

Our governments can be changed if we don't like their policies, but who is governing Google ?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology...d-eric-schmidt

The arrogance is breath taking.

Some of you might remember the EU fining Microsoft several billions when it added Explorer to Windows. Govt's decided that they (microsoft) were abusing their monopoly position to stifle competition. Back then they seemed to care when a company wielded too much power. However now they have lost their teeth.


:2 cents:

So not so anonymous after all............:1orglaugh

If not the tax, they owe to government at least to give access to their servers.

For all I know he was a spy for China and leaked the info on China's orders!

Google was floated and bloated using CIA seed money, as was facebook. :2 cents:

don't forget twitter. what about myspace?:1orglaugh

no it wasn't.

Strange how a perfectly rational point can be spoiled when the loons butt in !

so you're saying that facebook hasn't used CIA seed money?

how much proof do you need in order to know it was?

bitcoin blockchain is anon. the exchanges which are not part of the design, are not. the exchanges popped-up after the fact, as a service.

He will die with cancer! or hit by a lighting bolt.

You think huh?

Facebook for example got around 13 million in initial seed money from In-Q-Tel.

In-Q-Tel of Arlington, Virginia, United States is a not-for-profit venture capital firm that invests in high-tech companies for the sole purpose of keeping the Central Intelligence Agency, and other intelligence agencies, equipped with the latest in information technology in support of United States intelligence capability..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In-Q-Tel

and what do you know there's also reference to google CIA connections on the same page

"In-Q-Tel sold 5,636 shares of Google, worth over $2.2 million, on Nov 15, 2005.[6] The stocks were a result of Google’s acquisition of Keyhole, the CIA funded satellite mapping software now known as Google Earth."

well that saves me from digging up the info, thank you

:1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh

please.

1. the implication that investing in a start up give one access to that startup trade secrets is hilarious.

2. every single reference link on that wiki page is bullshit, except one, on that one it states:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...081401108.html

now go fuckk yourself for trying to derail a good thread with your bullshit ct rhetoric.

The accusation was that Google and Facebook were CREATED with CIA money.

And I think you will find that is patent bullshit.

:1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh

oh. and you're laughing because you know for a fact it wasn't

can you prove that?

I said floated. seed money...