Surveillance Quotes by Edward Snowden

In the United States, there hasn't been much legislative change on the surveillance issue, although there are some tepid proposals.

— Edward Snowden

Suspicionless surveillance does not become okay simply because it's only victimizing 95% of the world instead of 100%.

— Edward Snowden

The issue I brought forward most clearly was that of mass surveillance, not of surveillance in general.

— Edward Snowden

We have the means and we have the technology to end mass surveillance without any legislative action at all, without any policy…

— Edward Snowden

The NSA routinely lies in response to congressional inquiries about the scope of surveillance in America.

— Edward Snowden

I have used mass surveillance to target people, so I do know how it works.

— Edward Snowden

If we don't do anything, if we go along with the status quo, we are going to have a mass surveillance world.

— Edward Snowden

We need to put the security back in the National Security Agency. We can't have the national surveillance agency.

— Edward Snowden

Everyone everywhere now understands how bad things have gotten — and they’re talking about it. They have the power to decide for…

— Edward Snowden

We've seen a departure from the traditional work of the National Security Agency. They've become sort of the national hacking agency, the…

— Edward Snowden

The majority of terrorist attacks that have been disrupted in the United States have been disrupted due to things like the Time…

— Edward Snowden

Initially I was very encouraged. Unfortunately, the mainstream media now seems far more interested in what I said when I was 17…

— Edward Snowden

I considered bringing forward information about these surveillance programs prior to the election, but I held off because I believed that [Barack]…

— Edward Snowden

Look at the reactions of liberal governments to the surveillance revelations during the last years. In the United States, we've got this…

— Edward Snowden

Arguing that you don't care about privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don't care about…

— Edward Snowden

I can't in good conscience allow the U.S. government to destroy privacy, internet freedom and basic liberties for people around the world…

— Edward Snowden

A political decision has been made not to irritate the intelligence community. The spy agencies are really embarrassed, they're really sore -…

— Edward Snowden

If even one country, an Iceland for example, defects from this global legislative bargain and says no, we're not going to enforcement…

— Edward Snowden

Suspicionless surveillance has no place in a democracy. The next 60 days are a historic opportunity to rein in the NSA, but…

— Edward Snowden

When we look at the full-on mass surveillance watching everyone in the country, in the United States, it doesn't work. It didn't…

— Edward Snowden

Candidates run for election on campaign promises, but once they're elected they renege on those promises, which happened with President [Barack] Obama…

— Edward Snowden

I acted on my belief that the NSA's mass surveillance programs would not withstand a constitutional challenge, and that the American public…

— Edward Snowden

Someone recently talked about mass surveillance and the NSA revelations as being the atomic moment for computer scientists. The atomic bomb was…

— Edward Snowden

Internet exchanges and internet service providers - international fiber optic landing points - these are the key tools that governments go after…

— Edward Snowden

Lawyers from the NSA, as well as the UK's GCHQ, work very hard to search for loopholes in laws and constitutional protections…

— Edward Snowden

One of the foremost activities of the NSA's FAD, or Foreign Affairs Division, is to pressure or incentivize EU member states to…

— Edward Snowden

When we think in the context of the last decade's infringements upon personal liberty and the last year's revelations, it's not about…

— Edward Snowden

I was hoping to catch [Vladimir] Putin in a lie - like what happened to Director of National Intelligence James Clapper [in…

— Edward Snowden

Ending mass surveillance of private phone calls under the Patriot Act is a historic victory for the rights of every citizen. Yet…

— Edward Snowden

We have to argue forcefully and demand that the government recognise that these programmes do not prevent - mass surveillance does not…

— Edward Snowden

[Bill] Binney designed ThinThread, an NSA program that used encryption to try to make mass surveillance less objectionable. It would still have…

— Edward Snowden

I don't think there's anything, any threat out there today that anyone can point to, that justifies placing an entire population under…

— Edward Snowden

We have to call mass surveillance mass surveillance. We can't let governments around the world redefine, and sort of weasel their way…

— Edward Snowden

The most important thing to the United States is not being able to attack our adversaries, the most important thing is to…

— Edward Snowden

We have to recognise that rights are being violated. The United Nations actually filed a report that found that that was the…

— Edward Snowden

It's fascinating to see how things have changed. Basically, every time the US government gets off the soapbox of the Sunday-morning talk…

— Edward Snowden

The problem is when [the state] monitor all of us, en masse, all of the time, without any specific justification for intercepting…

— Edward Snowden

It's becoming less and less the National Security Agency and more and more the national surveillance agency. It's gaining more offensive powers…

— Edward Snowden

Many of our ally states don't have these constitutional protections - in the UK, in New Zealand, in Australia. They've lost the…

— Edward Snowden

When I was working in Japan, I created a system for ensuring that intelligence data was globally recoverable in the event of…

— Edward Snowden