Though that may sound like paranoia to some, Snowden has good reason for such fears. He worked in the US intelligence world for almost a decade. He knows that the biggest and most secretive surveillance organisation in America, the NSA, along with the most powerful government on the planet, is looking for him.
Edward Snowden. This is a name that will be in the history books for ages. He will be branded a traitor or a whistleblower depending on where you look. Many Americans feel that Edward Snowden is a traitor who sold the United States’ secrets aiming to harm the nation. Others believe that he was simply a citizen of the United States who exercised his right to expose the government for their unconstitutional actions. It is important to not only know the two sides to the argument of friend or foe, but to also know the facts as well. My goal in this paper is to present the facts without bias and to adequately portray the two sides of the argument.
Friday November 11th, I saw many articles of history claiming that government surveillance has been happening since Watergate and after the 9/11 attacks. Jane Harman implies that security sparked from the mistake of not protecting enough (Harman). The USA PATRIOT Act gave the government the authority to research forms of communication prior to 9/11 (“Domestic”). President George W. Bush authorized the National Security Agency, NSA, to look into the media and is believed to be the largest intelligence agency in the United States (“Domestic”). NSA has a location in Utah that can hold about 100 years of international data (Maney). Also, Lauren Regan claims that the new facility will be 1.5 million square feet (Regan 32). It’s shocking that they’ve made that big of a
Similarly, trap and trace devices checked what incoming phone numbers were calling a particular phone line. The USAPA now enables the FBI to eavesdrop on all computer routing, addressing and signaling information. It is done with a huge software system called Carnivore. This system filters through all internet packets (pieces of information traveling on the internet) that travel through a specific ISP, sniffing for a suspect’s electronic communication. It can only be installed on an ISP either with the ISP’s permission or a court order. The sneak and peak provision permits government officials with a warrant to search any tangible property or communications where notification of the search can be delayed for a “reasonable period.” This allows law enforcement to investigate without having to worry about compromising the case by tipping the suspect too early. Another notable change in the USAPA is it redefines of the term “foreign intelligence” to include domestic citizens. It reflects the fact that the perpetrators of 9/11 were living in the U.S. for years. Now foreign intelligence is defined as “information relating to the capabilities, intentions, or activities of foreign governments or elements thereof, foreign organizations, or foreign persons or international terrorist activities.” The definition continues about a U.S. person that concerns a foreign power or
Abdo, Alexander, and Patrick Toomey. "The NSA is turning the internet into a total surveillance system." Theguardian.com. 11 Aug. 2013. Guardian News and Media. 25 Feb. 2014 .
agents. They didn’t contain the contents of any U.S. military plans, or of any conversations between U.S. or foreign officials...But it will hardly surprise the organized terrorist groups, which already go to great lengths to avoid being monitored." (Cassidy 1). Snowden's revelations have only brought us alarming news on United States espionage upon their own people, which have individual rights to express what they wish to by the often cited First Amendment, even though they are being constantly surveyed upon sites such as Facebook and Yahoo where personal information is wholly visible by the government, even in the presence of privacy policies. Their logging of phone calls also puts many Americans at a severe risk of being targeted or put on further watch for choice words, and will not work on the intended, true terrorists to the country, as they do not use public communications system, at least not U.S. based ones. Even for the public, one will not have a phone call used for them as evidence unless it was recorded by a third party and it hints at their connection to a crime, disproving its pragmatic usage, even in higher
Headquarters of the National Security Agency (NSA), employees a multitude of employees consisting of computer scientists, analysists, linguists, voice interceptors and mathematicians. (Factory, T.S. Nova, 2009) The scope of what happens behind closed doors at the National Security Agency is mind boggling. The average citizen could not even begin to apprehend the complex work these professional complete in a normal work week. The employees at the National Security Agency monitor terrorist by intercepting and interpreting phone calls, e-mails, webmail, monitors social media and website sites. Nova’s program “The Spy Factory” explores how safe is our county when it comes to terrorism. Nova brings up some interesting facts that are chilling and make you think, are we really safe in America?
Snowden describes this tale, saying that "The N.S.A. has built an infrastructure that allows it to intercept almost everything. With this capability, the vast majority of human communications
Almost everyone uses the internet, and it is very easy to take for granted, but not many people know how easy it is for the government and NSA (National Security Agency) to
A number of the operations the NSA does are clandestine and obscure by the overall population. They are given this sanction by the administration to guarantee insurance of the US from terrorism and different dangers. The office regularly utilizes tame approaches to gather data on remote knowledge including electronic frameworks irritating, tapping phone records, and subverting through subversive programming. Mass reconnaissance of the United States is likewise a practice utilized by Security Agency, gathering and putting away all telephone records of all American subjects.
One of the biggest questions being asked today is if our own government is spying on us using these new technologies. There has been though that the government has been doing so for the past decades but few years the topic has been really brought to light with all of the terrible things going on throughout the world and in our own country. One of the most popular acquisitions that the government is taking is the idea that they are engaging in economic espionage. The NSA has been accused of this and through the past year have denied the acquisitions. Though this is not invading directly on the privacy of the public people what this is saying is that there is the potential for the government to access our personal privacy in many different ways. If they are able to gain access to probably some of the most private information on other countries economics that are more than likely protected with much higher security than that of our own personal email accounts than what can they really see about us.
To wrap it all up Edward Snowden is a traitor. He has violated the trust the CIA, NSA, and his bosses had in him to keep this information a secret. This means he has put us citizens in danger. Some might think that his spreading of this information is heroic. However, now that this information has been released there is a greater possibility that it could fall into the wrong hands and families would be put in danger of terrorist attacks. Now he is on the run and the U.S. government must catch him before he and the information he leaked are captured by terrorists and America’s
When the average American hears the word “spy” an image of a secret agent deep in the heart of Soviet territory, or a memory of his or her favorite James Bond movie probably pops into his or her head. This glorification of spying is no doubt a product of Hollywood’s dramatic representation of what they think a spy should be. The reality of what modern day spying consists of came as a shock to most when on June 5, 2013, an NSA contractor by the name of Edward Snowden executed what many consider to be the most significant leak of government information in U.S. history. Overnight, the American people learned that their government had been executing personal data collection of massive proportions. It was the U.S. Government’s worst fear, the people
Snowden would view his actions as right in according to the Deontology Duty Theory. The Duty Theory believes that an act is morally right if it in accord with a duty or obligations. With this said many would view Snowden as a Whistle Blower and Patriot, since he took action when he believed that it was his duty to reveal that N.S.A. was secretly invading the privacy of the people.
the NSA expansive power to spy on Americans’ international email and telephone calls. But in