The Vindication of Edward Snowden
A federal appeals court has ruled that one of the NSA programs he exposed was illegal.
(Source: The Atlantic)
Most people realize that emails and other digital communications they once considered private can now become part of their permanent record.
But even as they increasingly use apps that understand what they say, most people don’t realize that the words they speak are not so private anymore, either.
Top-secret documents from the archive of former NSA contractor Edward Snowden show the National Security Agency can now automatically recognize the content within phone calls by creating rough transcripts and phonetic representations that can be easily searched and stored.
It would be shortsighted for reporters and news organizations to continue to think of encryption and other privacy tools as essential only for those journalists hoping to hear from the next Snowden. Fortunately, it appears 2015 may be the year that message sinks in.
(Source: cjr.org)
We all know these stories of sources who take a risk to approach an institution and that institution doesn’t publish the information. I think that the existence of the Intercept or WikiLeaks or other outlets that are willing to publish that information creates a different media landscape…
…I don’t think what we’re doing is radical. I think it’s radical to censor information because the government asks you to. That’s radical.
Laura Poitras, Director and Producer, CitizenFour, to Wired. Laura Poitras on the Crypto Tools That Made Her Snowden Film Possible.
Context: Poitras is referring to the New York Times which withheld publication of the Bush administration’s warrantless wiretapping program for a year at the administration’s request.
The Tools: Poitras says she couldn’t have reported CitizenFour, her documentary on Edward Snowden and the NSA leaks, without a number of Open Source tools. These included, according to Wired, “the anonymity software Tor, the Tor-based operating system Tails, GPG encryption, Off-The-Record (OTR) encrypted instant messaging, hard disk encryption software Truecrypt, and Linux.”
Additionally, Poitras used the anonymizing operating system Tails on a computer dedicated solely for communicating with Snowden, according to Wired.
(via futurejournalismproject)
Reblogged from The FJP
WIRED’s James Bamford spent three days with Edward Snowden, the most time any journalist has spent with Snowden since he arrived in Russia in June 2013.
Read Bamford’s full account of his time with the whistleblower in The Most Wanted Man in the World | WIRED
The detention of Miranda has rightly caused international dismay because it feeds into a perception that the US and UK governments – while claiming to welcome the debate around state surveillance started by Snowden – are also intent on stemming the tide of leaks and on pursuing the whistleblower with a vengeance. That perception is right.
Alan Rusbridger, editor at the Guardian. He goes on to provide details about how the UK government forced the Guardian to destroy hard drives with beyond repair.
(Source: theguardian.com)
Laura and Glenn are among the few who reported fearlessly on controversial topics throughout this period, even in the face of withering personal criticism, [which] resulted in Laura specifically becoming targeted by the very programs involved in the recent disclosures. She had demonstrated the courage, personal experience and skill needed to handle what is probably the most dangerous assignment any journalist can be given — reporting on the secret misdeeds of the most powerful government in the world — making her an obvious choice.
Edward Snowden
In this long read from the New York Times Magazine, investigative reporter Peter Maas takes an in-depth look at Laura Poitras and Glenn Greenwald, who helped Snowden publicize the NSA leaks, highlighting their approach to publishing the material and the security issues they now face.
How Laura Poitras Helped Snowden Spill His Secrets - NYTimes.com
(Source: The New York Times)
Reactions to Mashable’s Digital Bill of Rights
Inspired by the NSA ordeal, Mashable’s collaborative Google Doc lists the digital freedoms and protections for Internet users.
When Edward Snowden leaked information about the U.S. government’s widespread mass surveillance programs, we learned just how vulnerable our personal information might be. We’re living in an era where digital boundaries don’t exist and governments can gain extensive access to user data without our knowledge.
In the face of these revelations, this is the moment when we must stand up and establish a Digital Bill of Rights.
We’re creating a document to highlight the digital freedoms and protections that we feel each user should be guaranteed as a citizen of the Internet, and we want your help. Below is a draft of the Digital Bill of Rights that we have crowdsourced through our social media community.
Readers can contribute suggestions directly on the document. The initiative garnered quite a few thought-provoking comments, like the ones above, which have been curated by Mashable here.
Images: Mashable
Reblogged from The FJP
npr:
Edward Snowden: ‘I do not expect to see home again’ The whistleblower behind the NSA surveillance revelations speaks out.
The man who leaked NSA information to the press revealed himself over the weekend. Read and listen to analysis from NPR’s Tom Gjelten on NPR’s The Two-Way.
Edward Snowden is currently holed up in a hotel room in Hong Kong—a move NPR’s Frank Langfitt explores in his Morning Edition story filed from Shanghai.
It appears, by the way, that Snowden made a tactical error by heading to Hong Kong, which has an extradition agreement with the United States. He should’ve traveled to Iceland, where he might have had more of a shot.
EDIT: The Washington Post reports that Snowden checked out of his hotel room.
Reblogged from ShortFormBlog
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