A few weeks ago, Edward Snowden, a former contractor for America’s National Security Agency (NSA), revealed through The Guardian and Der Spiegel that the US government has been keeping secret records on ordinary Americans and spying on its allies. Since then, I’ve been asked two questions over and over: 1. What’s your opinion of what Edward Snowden did? and 2. Do you know where he is?
The second question has a simple answer: no. Edward Snowden, it seems, has followed Monty Python’s example and learned how not to be seen.
The first question is difficult to answer, because it involves a paradox, or several.
• Edward Snowden broke the law. Lawbreakers are to be punished.
BUT
Edward Snowden is a whistleblower. Whistleblowers are to be protected.
• Edward Snowden is working against the United States by revealing information that was secret.
BUT
Edward Snowden is working for the United States by creating transparency, which is necessary for the rule of law.
• A free society respects the rule of law. The highest law of the land is the constitution. The US constitution guarantees a right to privacy.
BUT
NSA surveillance undermines privacy and freedom. Therefore the rule of law does not apply. Edward Snowden cannot have broken laws that are not supposed to exist.
• If Edward Snowden revealed this information about Russia or China, the West would support him. If he were an investigative journalist, it would tolerate him.
BUT
He revealed this information about the United States, and he is not a journalist.
• Edward Snowden is fighting for a free society.
BUT
Societies that are not free are the ones protecting him.
And so on.
A paradox is a powerful thing. As Captain Kirk taught us, it can shut down a malevolent android in seconds flat.
From Star Trek (the original series): “I, Mudd”
The Snowden paradox is a form of the Robin Hood paradox. By stealing from the rich and giving to the poor, Robin Hood served a greater good — a natural law, if you will — but his actions made him a criminal.
There are ways to resolve such paradoxes. For example, one side does not have to be wrong and the other right; both can be wrong. It is also possible for two sides to both be right.
Another way to resolve a paradox is to challenge one or all of the assumptions on which an argument is based — or to declare any or all of them to be irrelevant. This would seem to be the case with Snowden.
The NSA has been collecting Americans’ phone records for ten years
You see, Snowden’s revelations aren’t new. The NSA has been collecting Americans’ phone records for ten years. A whistleblower at the phone company AT&T discovered the NSA doing this in 2006. The Electronic Frontier Foundation sued AT&T, but the case was dismissed in 2011 when Congress gave the phone companies retroactive immunity for their complicity.
Personal information on every American was collected in a 2002 Defense Department program originally called Total Information Awareness. Public opposition shut down parts of the program, but the collection of phone records is one aspect that remains in place.
It’s been revealed time and again that the US government wants to read all the e-mail sent by everybody in the entire world, and listen to all phone calls made between US and foreign numbers. The name and design of the software changes every few years; one such program, first used in 1997, was called Carnivore. The Internet service providers complained about the extra work they’d have to do to intercept and store the data, but were talked into complying.
The US has been spying on its allies for decades. Look up ECHELON. Look up the US wiretaps of UN Security Council members prior to the Iraq War.
The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) court, which grants warrants for secret wiretaps, not just of foreigners, was established in 1978.
Banks, credit-card companies and American-based websites such as Facebook explicitly tell European customers that their data or a copy of it is being stored in the United States and may be given to government officials at any time.
None of this is new. Mr. Snowden, paradox or not, you’re off the hook.
