Edward Snowden: A Cyber Aficionado
Edward Snowden, once one of the U.S.A.'s most wanted cyber criminals has performed many tasks deemed treasonous, as well as heroic. Snowden has tremendously helped the citizens of America's knowledge of their government's actions in addition to having a better understanding of their constitutional rights. Edward Snowden has affected U.S, citizen's knowledge by exposing data about the NSA's spying on residents, helping citizens recognize their basic freedoms and rights, and displaying how weak security and privacy is thus encouraging companies to have stronger encryption and user privacy.
Edward Snowden is a world renowned whistleblower who benefitted citizens' awareness around the world. Snowden began
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Citizens became furious about the metadata collection by the NSA, even James Sensenbrenner, the mane who wrote the Patriot Act, said it was too much. Snowden's leaking motivated citizens to push for their rights and eventually convinced Congress to pass a bill to end data-mining. The information Snowden leaked motivated a federal judge to say the spying was unconstitutional, as well as a violation to citizen's rights. Even federal judges agree with Snowden that the NSA violates people's rights and the judge said so in a lawsuit. Without Snowden, the debate over surveillance never would have happened and citizens would not push for privacy rights. Citizens would have no acknowledgement of high-end government surveillance programs and they would not be pushing for privacy if it was not for Edward Snowden. Snowden allowed citizens to acknowledge their intrusion on basic constitutional …show more content…
By the works of Edward Snowden, "Service providers have raced to prove which can protect their users' data better"(Trimm). Snowden's whistleblowing encouraged Internet giants to encrypt and secure all data, to prevent hackers, like Snowden, and the NSA from spying. Furthermore, Snowden convinced Internet giants to upgrade their security, "Google...led the way in providing encryption..."(Trimm). Due to Snowden's leaks, Google employees went ballistic as privacy enthusiasts, and started and end-to-end encryption plug-in as well as shaming companies who do not encrypt messages. Many journalists use PGP email encryption and other third party applications to encourage the submission of whistleblowing information. News organization now use secure email encryption to obtain information without the NSA possibly intercepting the message before it is leaked, because of Snowden. Because of Edward Snowden, some of the largest companies in the world increased their privacy and encryption to prevent NSA spying on their users, thus benefitting citizen's knowledge of
Edward Snowden was an American computer specialist that worked for the CIA and as a contractor for the NSA. He disclosed classified files over several media sources, that were evidence that the NSA was collecting data from the phone calls and internet activities of most Americans. Snowden thought that by revealing these secret government activities that Americans would realized that their privacy is being invaded and that they need to do something about it.
Edward Snowden is America’s most recent controversial figure. People can’t decide if he is their hero or traitor. Nevertheless, his leaks on the U.S. government surveillance program, PRISM, demand an explanation. Many American citizens have been enraged by the thought of the government tracing their telecommunication systems. According to factbrowser.com 54% of internet users would rather have more online privacy, even at the risk of security (Facts Tagged with Privacy). They say it is an infringement on their privacy rights of the constitution. However, some of them don’t mind; they believe it will help thwart the acts of terrorists. Both sides make a good point, but the inevitable future is one where the government is adapting as technology is changing. In order for us to continue living in the new digital decade, we must accept the government’s ability to surveil us.
In early June 2013, Edward Snowden, a 29-year-old former defense contractor who had access to NSA database while working for an intelligence consulting company, leaked classified documents reports that the National Security Agency (NSA) is recording phone calls of millions of Americans along with gathering private data and spying foreign Internet activity. The Washington Post later broke the news disclosed PRISM, a program can collect data on Internet users. The leaked documents publicly stated a vast objection. Many people were shocked by the scale of the programs, even elected representatives were unaware of the surveillance range. A nationwide debate over privacy rights have been sparked. Although supporters claim that the NSA only does its best to protect the United States from terrorists as well as respecting Americans' rights and privacy, many civil rights advocates feel that the government failed to be clear about the limit of the surveillance programs, threatening Americans' civil...
Daniel Ellsberg is a political activist. He was the one who leaked the information to the New York Times. Daniel Ellsberg was morally correct, but what he did was illegal. Daniel Ellsberg saved a lot of lives, sort of. He knew that the government was hiding something, and discovered it.
We all heard of 9/11. I mean who hasn’t heard of 9/11, do you guys know who planned and attacked the Twin Towers, the Pentagon and try to hit the U.S Capitol. It is Osama Bin Laden the dead terrorist and the leader of Al Qaeda. Osama Bin Laden is a terrorist that bombed the U.S and the western philosophy by attacking U.S embassies, the Oklahoma city suicide attack and a lot more suicide attacks that are really dangerous. He was born in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia in 1957 or 1958.
Before all of the top secret NSA (National Security Agency) documents on which details of a global surveillance system run by NSA were breached, Edward Snowden was an American computer specialist, a CIA member, and an NSA contractor. Edward Snowden was a regular, wealthy, government employee with some great positions and credentials. He was an American born man and was serving his country. He won the Sam Adams award which is given once a year to an intelligence professional who shows great integrity to the CIA. Many other recipients of this award have also been whistle blowers like Snowden. Before all the leaking and background information is given keep the question of hero or villain in your mind.
Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency (N.S.A) subcontractor turned whistle-blower is nothing short of a hero. His controversial decision to release information detailing the highly illegal ‘data mining’ practices of the N.S.A have caused shockwaves throughout the world and have raised important questions concerning how much the government actually monitors its people without their consent or knowledge. Comparable to Mark Felt in the Watergate scandals, Daniel Ellsberg with the Pentagon Papers, Edward Snowden joins the rank of infamous whistleblowers who gave up their jobs, livelihood, and forever will live under scrutiny of the public all in the service to the American people. Edward Snowden released information detailing the extent of the N.S.A breaches of American privacy and in doing so, became ostracized by the media and barred from freely reentering America, his home country.
Many people have mixed feelings about how they should differentiate Edward Snowden as a hero or a traitor. It is true what he had done was unjust and could have been handled another way without all the drama and getting nicknamed traitor by many and hero by few. His act on the NSA forced him into making a deal with Russia to stay at an asylum for a year, because some people in Russia believed in what he had done and did not doubt him unlike some people who thought of Snowden as a traitor to the government. There has been many polls, articles and interviews on Edward Snowden and how people thinks about his act of “exposing” the NSA for spying into the citizens personal life. Some may differ with Snowden by saying, what the NSA is doing is to protect the pe...
MacAskill, G. G. (2014, April 28). NSA Prism program taps in to user data of Apple, Google and others. Retrieved from The Guardian: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jun/06/us-tech-giants-nsa-data?guni=Network%20front:network-front%20main-2%20Special%20trail:Network%20front%20-%20special%20trail:Position1
why it was justifiable and how it did in a way enhance democracy in the United States. Snowden
Love, Dylan. "The NSA Probably Gained Access To Google And Yahoo's Data By Tapping Their Cable." Business Insider. Business Insider, Inc, 26 Nov. 2013. Web. 5 Feb. 2014.
He took a job with the NSA, unaware of its devious practices. When he found out that the NSA was spying on American citizens, however, his conscience arose, glowered, and said: “No, that simply won’t do.” Snowden’s innate sense of morality informed him that the NSA had overstepped its boundaries and that its operations were unconstitutional, unscrupulous and tyrannical. So, he stole information and posted it online, becoming a traitor to his country but not to his conscience. Because of him, we understood the extremely serious invasions of our privacy that the NSA had perpetrated, and we took steps to stop it. The government, as seen from history, often needs the rebellion of its people in order to realize that a law is unjust. Perhaps primarily because of Snowden’s whistle-blowing, the NSA’s vague and shadowy powers were
(source) And an impressive scale of 425 million active user of Google Mail as of June 2012. In addition, possible growing to 2014. This exceeds the amount of population here in America 316.1 million people. Therefore, google is safe to say that many individuals have used its services and data. The government is also using this data by requesting it from google for security reasons. According to the transparency report in google, a site where it shows how many requests that government have made to request data from users. From December of 2009 to June of 2014, every year there has been an increase of user data request from the government ______ %. Moreover, thanks to the third party doctrine – government agencies can request data from other tech giant like Facebook, Microsoft, and apple. On the Pew internet project research has been found that 71% of online adults use Facebook. Facebook a social media site where you can create personal profile, add other people as friends, post status updates and images. The Facebook transparency report have also shown same increase of request government of personal data similar to google but up ____% more. Unfortunately, people treat this free site as a benign company where they can post every intimate second of their life to this site. If you are a resident
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.
In conclusion, Edward Snowden was justified in leaking the unlawful actions conducted by the NSA because he wanted to uphold the constitutional rights of privacy, which Americans are entitled to. While few may view Edward Snowden as a traitor for sharing sensitive information to the public, many commend him for his courageousness. Snowden broke the law in order to expose the unlawful practices conducted by governments officials. It is unfortunate to live in a society where the people elected to protect the rights of the people are the ones violating them.. It takes a lot of strength and courage for one man to stand up against the government, to protect the rights of an entire nation. Edward Snowden will go down in history as one of the most notorious whistle blowers