After seeing
the interview I got other thoughts, and I agree with his actions. The way he
talked about it was really amazing. He is a very well educated man, and he
knows what he talks about. He explained what the government does with all this
data, and what it actually means to spy on a person. He told how easy it is to track a laptop, but
also how to tag individuals, or track their ``usernames`` and build a
fingerprint.
He meant
that the public had the rights to know how all of these systems work. And I totally agree with that, even though it
was a bit shocking. If there is some one
of you that never have heard of him, here are some facts (we actually used padlet.com
in our class to share our notes about him- check it out)
And here
are some facts about him which I found on the internet:
·
Edward
Snowden is a former National Security Agency subcontractor who made headlines
in 2013 when he leaked top secret information about NSA surveillance
activities.
·
While
working at the NSA's Oahu office, Snowden began noticing government programs
involving the NSA spying on American citizens via phone calls and internet use.
Before long, leaving his "very comfortable life" and $200,000 salary
behind, in May 2013, Snowden began copying top-secret NSA documents while at
work, building a dossier on practices that he found invasive and disturbing.
The documents contained vast and damning information on the NSA's domestic
surveillance practices, including spying on millions of American citizens under
the umbrella of programs such as PRISM.
·
After
he had compiled a large store of documents, Snowden told his NSA supervisor
that he needed a leave of absence to undergo treatment for epilepsy, a
condition recently diagnosed. He also told his girlfriend that he'd be leaving
Hawaii for a few weeks, remaining vague about why.
·
On
May 20, 2013, Snowden took a flight to Hong Kong, China, where he remained
during the early stages of the fallout. This fallout began the following month,
on June 5, when the United Kingdom's Guardian newspaper released secret
documents obtained from Snowden about an American intelligence body (Foreign
Intelligence Surveillance Court) demanding that Verizon release information
"on a daily basis" culled from its American customers' activities.
·
The
following day, the Guardian and the Washington Times released Snowden's leaked
information on PRISM, an NSA program that allows real-time information
collection, in this case, solely information on American citizens. A flood of
information followed, and the American people, the international community and
the U.S. government have since been scrambling to either hear more about it or
have Snowden arrested.
He has also
said that he is willing to sacrifice his life because he can't in good
conscience allow the U.S. government to destroy privacy, internet freedom and
basic liberties for people around the world with this massive surveillance
machine they're secretly building. - Something that not many of us would say or
stand for.
So here you
have the whole story: Do you think that he should go to prison for that? Will
he ever get back to the USA?
Personally I am really looking forward how this ``case`` will continue, and I really hope that he will not end up in prison.
-Ewa
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