Edward Snowden discusses ethics of surveillance and whistle-blowing with Gellman '82

Edward Snowden and journalist Barton Gellman ’82 discussed mass surveillance and privacy in a public conversation on campus on Saturday morning.

Snowden, a former contractor at the National Security Agency who disclosed information about the NSA’s surveillance practices to Gellman and Glenn Greenwald, is in exile in Russia and joined the discussion via a live telecast.

Since the disclosure of this information two years ago, “we’ve learned a lot that we didn’t know,” Gellman said.

The interview-styled conversation between Gellman and Snowden focused on questions of cryptography, mass surveillance and the ethics of whistle-blowing.

“[The problem is that information is] increasingly getting into the hands of average citizens,” Snowden said.“Culturally, the government has adopted a worldview that if it is out there, we should know it, and we should have access to it."

Governments today have more investigative power than in the past, Snowden said. Lookingup information in a database, as long as there is some justification for a search, has begun to be embedded into the culture and the fabric of the government, he said.

“[Encryption is the] technological enforcement of historical liberties,” Snowden said, addingcitizens should defend their rights to encryption.

The problem with mass surveillance is that based on the evidence, it does not work, Snowden said.

The fact that the NSA was monitoring everyone’s calls did not stop the Boston bombings, Snowden said. Part of the reason is that there is a finite amount of man-hours and there are flaws with bulk data collection, in which the government acquires information but does not necessarily look at it, Snowden explained.

When Gellman asked whether the U.S. Constitution can protect everyone equally, Snowden said that the question should be more about natural human rights. The human right to privacy is inherent, Snowden said.

Gellman asked if Snowden’s coworkers and other members of the NSA believed in the goals of the NSA — protecting people and national security — at the time.

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Of his coworkers and other volunteers who decided to join the NSA, none of them were bad people, Snowden said. Snowden said he got thinking only about the problematic side of the NSA's operations as a result of conversations with other coworkers and how everyone on the inside “was deeply unsettled.”

However, Snowden said his coworkers had warned him that if he revealed anything, he would be "destroyed."

This led Gellman to ask about the ethics of whistle-blowing and how to deal with transgressing the sharp line that exists in the intelligence community.

“We’re modeled upon a system of checks and balances,” Snowden said, adding he intended for his own actions to be a check and balance in the system. Instead of publishing things himself, he partnered with journalists and institutions that are well respected to “blow the whistle in the best way,” Snowden said.

However, with freedom of press, there is always a risk, Snowden added.

“There is no question that these programs are controversial,” Snowden said. “This is something that needs to change."

The event, “Edward Snowden in Conversation with Bart Gellman,” took place on Saturday at 10:30 a.m. in the Friend Center, and Snowden's part was telecasted. The discussion was co-sponsored by the University's Center for Information Technology Policy, the Program in Law and Public Affairs and the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs.