Edward Snowden, by his own account, grew up as a “shape-shifter.” His father worked for the Coast Guard, his mother for the Maryland state courts. But his parents’ appearances in Snowden’s new memoir, Permanent Record, are fleeting and superficial. The more enduring influences on his life—his sociocultural parental units, as it were—were the civil service...
Tag: Edward Snowden
Post
Post
Post
Whistleblowers, Good and Bad
An open letter from more than 100 former national security officials applauds the “responsible whistleblower” who came forward with information about President Trump’s Ukraine dealings. While the identity of the whistleblower is unknown, “we do know that he or she is an employee of the U.S. Government,” the signatories say. “As such, he or she...
Post
Puppies and Covert Ops: Edward Snowden Explains Why the CIA Just Made an Instagram
I thought I was the only one bothered by the fact that the CIA has a Twitter account, which effectively serves as a domestic propaganda channel, and that the agency plans to add an Instagram account soon. I have company: Edward Snowden. In a podcast with the tech site Motherboard, the NSA whisteblower explained why...
Post
Was Snowden Right? Disputed NSA Phone Program Is Shut Down
In June 2013, NSA network administrator Edward Snowden gave Glenn Greenwald and the Guardian internal documentation of a surveillance system that analyzes logs of Americans’ domestic calls and texts in the search for suspected terrorists. Now, a senior Capitol Hill Republican staffer says NSA has discontinued the program and the Trump administration might not ask...