Snowden Quotes

Encryption works. Properly implemented strong crypto systems are one of the few things that you can rely on. Unfortunately, endpoint security is so terrifically weak that NSA can frequently find ways around it. ~ Edward Snowden

Much of what I saw in Geneva really disillusioned me about how my government functions and what its impact is in the world. I realized that I was part of something that was doing far more harm than good. ~ Edward Snowden

When the United States cannibalize dollars from the defensive business of the NSA, securing our communications, protecting our systems, patching zero-day vulnerabilities, and instead we're giving those dollars to be used for creating new vulnerabilities in our systems so that they can surveil us and other people abroad who use the same systems. ~ Edward Snowden

I would rather be without a state than without a voice. ~ Edward Snowden

I don't want to live in a society that does these sort of things. ~ Edward Snowden

Internet exchanges and internet service providers - international fiber optic landing points - these are the key tools that governments go after in order to enable their programs of mass surveillance. If they want to be able to watch the entire population of a country instead of a single individual, you have to go after those bulk interchanges. ~ Edward Snowden

I believe that when senator Ron Wyden and senator Mark Udall asked about the scale of this, they the NSA said it did not have the tools to provide an answer. We do have the tools and I have maps showing where people have been scrutinized most. We collect more digital communications from America than we do from the Russians. ~ Edward Snowden

For future Snowdens, we want to show there is an organization that will do what we did for Snowden - as much as possible - in raising money for legal defense and public advocacy for whistleblowers so they know if they come forward there is a support group for them. ~ Sarah Harrison

I had hoped to serve my country, but instead I went to work for it. This is not a trivial distinction. ~ Edward Snowden

Even though we don't know which companies the NSA has compromised – or by what means – knowing that they could have compromised any of them is enough to make us mistrustful of all of them. This is going to make it hard for large companies like Google and Microsoft to get back the trust they lost. Even if they succeed in limiting government surveillance. Even if they succeed in improving their own internal security. The best they'll be able to say is: "We have secured ourselves from the NSA, except for the parts that we either don't know about or can't talk about. ~ Bruce Schneier

ISIS went to school on how we were collecting intelligence on terrorist organizations by using telecommunications technologies. And when they learned that from the [Edward] Snowden disclosures, they were able to adapt to it and essentially go silent. ~ Michael Morell

We're losing our way as a society. If we don't stand up, if we don't say what we think those rights should be, and if we don't protect them, we will very soon find out that we do not have them. ~ Edward Snowden

The NSA was actually concerned back in the time of the crypto-wars with improving American security. Nowadays, we see that their priority is weakening our security, just so they have a better chance of keeping an eye on us. ~ Edward Snowden

There are times throughout history and it doesn't take long for either an American or a German, to think about times in the history of their country where the law provided the Government to do things which were not right. ~ Edward Snowden

I have no intention of hiding who I am because I know I have done nothing wrong. ~ Edward Snowden

The great fear that I have regarding the outcome for America of these disclosures is that nothing will change. [People] won't be willing to take the risks necessary to stand up and fight to change things And in the months ahead, the years ahead, it's only going to get worse. [The NSA will] say that because of the crisis, the dangers that we face in the world, some new and unpredicted threat, we need more authority, we need more power, and there will be nothing the people can do at that point to oppose it. And it will be turnkey tyranny. ~ Edward Snowden

Truth, it has been said, is the first casualty of war. ~ Philip Snowden, 1st Viscount Snowden

The majority of people in developed countries spend at least some time interacting with the Internet, and Governments are abusing that necessity in secret to extend their powers beyond what is necessary and appropriate. ~ Edward Snowden

America is a fundamentally good country. We have good people with good values who want to do the right thing. But the structures of power that exist are working to their own ends to extend their capability at the expense of the freedom of all publics. ~ Edward Snowden

The NSA and Israel wrote Stuxnet together. ~ Edward Snowden

I was right outside the NSA [on 9/11], so I remember the tension on that day. I remember hearing on the radio, 'the plane's hitting,' and I remember thinking my grandfather, who worked for the FBI at the time, was in the Pentagon when the plane hit it ... I take the threat of terrorism seriously, and I think we all do. And I think it's really disingenuous for the government to invoke and sort-of scandalize our memories to sort-of exploit the national trauma that we all suffered together and worked so hard to come through
and to justify programs that have never been shown to keep us safe, but cost us liberties and freedoms that we don't need to give up, and that our Constitution says we should not give up. ~ Edward Snowden

All I wanted was for the public to be able to have a say in how they are governed. That is a milestone we left a long time ago. ~ Edward Snowden

FBI creating a world where citizens rely on Apple to defend their rights, rather than the other way around. ~ Edward Snowden

Once you go digging into the actual technical mechanisms by which predictability is calculated, you come to understand that its science is, in fact, anti-scientific, and fatally misnamed: predictability is actually manipulation. A website that tells you that because you liked this book you might also like books by James Clapper or Michael Hayden isn't offering an educated guess as much as a mechanism of subtle coercion. ~ 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 with this massive surveillance machine they're secretly building. ~ Edward Snowden

Despite Russia's move to raise interest rates this week, the value of the ruble has continued to crash. Russia's economy is so bad, Edward Snowden had to put government secrets on Craigslist. ~ Jimmy Fallon

I was thinking about how people were upset about the information that came out from Snowden about the NSA - many people were upset, including myself. But I was kind of surprised by how little we did about it - how little fighting we did. ~ Maggie Gyllenhaal

The most important thing to the United States is not being able to attack our adversaries, the most important thing is to be able to defend ourselves. And we can't do that as long as we're subverting our own security standards for the sake of surveillance. ~ Edward Snowden

You are not even aware of what is possible. The extent of their capabilities is horrifying. We can plant bugs in machines. Once you go on the network, I can identify your machine. You will never be safe whatever protections you put in place. ~ Edward Snowden

Patriots don't go to Russia. They don't seek asylum in Cuba. They don't seek asylum in Venezuela. They fight their cause here. Edward Snowden is a coward. He is a traitor. And he has betrayed his country. And if he wants to come home tomorrow to face the music, he can do so. ~ John F. Kerry

The United States is more reliant on the technical systems. We're more reliant on the critical infrastructure of the internet than any other nation out there. And when there's such a low barrier to entering the domain of cyber-attacks we're starting a fight that we can't win. ~ Edward Snowden

When Laura Poitras asked me if she could film our encounters, I was extremely reluctant. I'm grateful that I allowed her to persuade me. The result is a brave and brilliant film that deserves the honor and recognition it has received. My hope is that this award will encourage more people to see the film and be inspired by its message that ordinary citizens, working together, can change the world. ~ Edward Snowden

If the United States is promoting the development of exploits, of vulnerabilities, of insecurity in this critical infrastructure, and we're not fixing it when we find it, instead we put it on the shelf so we can use it the next time we want to launch an attack against some foreign country. We're leaving ourselves at risk. ~ Edward Snowden

Edward Snowden isn't a traitor. He reported the crime of conspiracy to deny citizens of their constitutional rights. NetworkEtiquette.net ~ David Chiles

I don't want to hide. If I get arrested, I get arrested. ~ Edward Snowden

I'm worried that the government might kill Edward Snowden with a drone.
Ron Paul ~ Ron Paul

Saving Edward Snowden from prison is one of WikiLeaks' achievements of which I am most proud. ~ Sarah Harrison

When you're attacking a router on the internet, and you're doing it remotely, it's like trying to shoot the moon with a rifle. Everything has to happen exactly right. Every single variable has to be controlled and precisely accounted for. And that's not possible to do when you have limited knowledge of the target you're attacking. ~ Edward Snowden

Snowden has been very sparing about discussing his early life or his personal life. ~ Barton Gellman

If I am traitor, who did I betray? I gave all my information to the American public, to American journalists who are reporting on American issues. If they see that as treason, I think people really need to consider who they think they're working for. The public is supposed to be their boss, not their enemy. ~ Edward Snowden

Snowden has presented us with choices on how we want to move forward into the future. We're at a crossroads and we still don't quite know which path we're going to take. Without Snowden, just about everyone would still be in the dark about the amount of information the government is collecting. I think that Snowden has changed consciousness about the dangers of surveillance. ~ Laura Poitras

We need the security standards to apply to the internet. We need to be able to trust that when we send our emails through Verizon, that Verizon isn't sharing with the NSA, that Verizon isn't sharing them with the FBI or German intelligence or French intelligence or Russian intelligence or Chinese intelligence. ~ Edward Snowden

Snowden was horrified to discover that behind bars he would have no access to a computer. ~ Luke Harding

Allowing the U.S. government to intimidate its people with threats of retaliation for revealing wrongdoing is contrary to the public interest. ~ Edward Snowden

I have had many opportunities to flee HK, but I would rather stay and fight the United States government in the courts, because I have faith in Hong Kong's rule of law. ~ Edward Snowden

I don't want the stage. I'm terrified of giving these talking heads some distraction, some excuse to jeopardize, smear, and delegitimize a very important movement. ~ Edward Snowden

They are intent on making every conversation and every form of behavior in the world known to them. ~ Edward Snowden

On December 1, 2012, I received my first communication from Edward Snowden, ~ Anonymous

I'm not a spy, which is the real question ~ Edward Snowden

As a general rule, US-based multinationals should not be trusted until they prove otherwise. This is sad, because they have the capability to provide the best and most trusted services in the world if they actually desire to do so. ~ Edward Snowden

What the government wants is something they never had before. They want total awareness. The question is, is that something we should be allowing? ~ Edward Snowden

Snowden has enough [sic] information to cause harm to the U.S. government in a single minute than any other person has ever had. The U.S. government should be on its knees every day begging that nothing happen to Snowden, because if something does happen to him, all the information will be revealed and it could be its worst nightmare. ~ Glenn Greenwald

Was the leaker in question, Ed Snowden, was he a traitor? ~ Michele Bachmann

I'm cold,' Snowden said softly, 'I'm cold.'
'You're going to be all right, kid,' Yossarian reassured him with a grin. 'You're going to be all right.'
'I'm cold,' Snowden said again in a frail, childlike voice. 'I'm cold.'
'There, there,' Yossarian said, because he did not know what else to say. 'There, there.'
'I'm cold,' Snowden whimpered. 'I'm cold.'
'There, there. There, there. ~ Joseph Heller

If you ask anybody at Cyber Command or look at any of the job listings for openings for their positions, you'll see that the one thing they don't prioritize is computer network defense. It's all about computer network attack and computer network exploitation at Cyber Command. ~ Edward Snowden

When you are subverting the power of government, that's a fundamentally dangerous thing to democracy. ~ Edward Snowden

For a spy novelist like me, the Edward J. Snowden story has everything. A man driven by ego and idealism - can anyone ever distinguish the two? - leaves his job and his beautiful girlfriend behind. He must tell the world the Panopticon has arrived. His masters vow to punish him, and he heads for Moscow in a desperate search for refuge. ~ Alex Berenson

What has a great value to us as a nation is the internet itself. The internet is critical infrastructure to the United States. We use the internet for every communication that businesses rely on every day. ~ Edward Snowden

I don't play online games...but I love a good mystery. ~ Felicity Snowden

Eric Holder, our attorney general, says the Mr. Snowden will be brought to justice. Just as soon as we can find someone who can track his calls and read his emails. ~ Bill Maher

That, ultimately, is the critical flaw or design defect intentionally integrated into every system, in both politics and computing: the people who create the rules have no incentive to act against themselves. ~ Edward Snowden

I can do more good outside of prison ... This country is worth dying for. ~ Edward Snowden

When people conceptualize a cyber-attack, they do tend to think about parts of the critical infrastructure like power plants, water supplies, and similar sort of heavy infrastructure, critical infrastructure areas. And they could be hit, as long as they're network connected, as long as they have some kind of systems that interact with them that could be manipulated from internet connection. ~ Edward Snowden

One of the most surreal aspects of the NSA stories based on the Snowden documents is how they made even the most paranoid conspiracy theorists seem like paragons of reason and common sense. ~ Bruce Schneier

We don't have to ask for our privacy, we can take it back ~ Edward Snowden

There's no question that the US is engaged in economic spying. If there's information at Siemens that they think would be beneficial to the national interests, not the national security of the United States, they'll go after that information and they'll take it. ~ Edward Snowden

If we think that democracy is a good thing, then we must believe that the public should know as much as possible about what the government it elects is doing. Snowden has said that he made the disclosures because "the public needs to decide whether these programs and policies are right or wrong. ~ Peter Singer

I had traveled to Russia and met with Snowden, which was a pretty involved meeting that required encrypted communication and the like. And it was fascinating because of who he is and what he's done. And more so because what's going on between our two countries, Russia and the U.S., and to meet Edward Snowden in Russia was unforgettable. ~ Jared Leto

Your rights matter, because you never know when you're going to need them. ~ 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 deserved a chance to see these issues determined by open courts. Today, a secret program authorized by a secret court was, when exposed to the light of day, found to violate Americans' rights. It is the first of many. ~ Edward Snowden

There can be no faith in government if our highest offices are excused from scrutiny - they should be setting the example of transparency. ~ Edward Snowden

There are proxies, proxy servers on the internet, and this is very typical for hackers to use. They create what are called proxy chains where they gain access to a number of different systems around the world, sometimes by hacking these, and they use them as sort of relay boxes. ~ Edward Snowden

I believe that at this point in history, the greatest danger to our freedom and way of life comes from the reasonable fear of omniscient State powers kept in check by nothing more than policy documents. ~ Edward Snowden

If at any point during your journey through this book you paused for a moment over a term you wanted to clarify or investigate further and typed it into a search engine - and if that term happened to be in some way suspicious, a term like XKEYSCORE, for example - then congrats: you're in the system, a victim of your own curiosity. ~ Edward Snowden

These programs were never about terrorism: they're about economic spying, social control, and diplomatic manipulation. They're about power. ~ Edward Snowden

The immoral cannot be made moral through the use of secret law. ~ Edward Snowden

So when they say I'm a low-level systems administrator, that I don't know what I'm talking about, I'd say it's somewhat misleading, ~ Edward Snowden

Sometimes inexplicably the past becomes intermingled with the present ~ Felicity Snowden

There's not much value to us attacking Chinese systems. We might take a few computers offline. We might take a factory offline. We might steal secrets from a university research programs, and even something high-tech. But how much more does the United States spend on research and development than China does? ~ Edward Snowden

The internet is the most complex system that humans have ever invented. And with every internet enabled operation that we've seen so far, all of these offensive operations, we see knock on effects. We see unintended consequences. ~ Edward Snowden

A: Snowden has enough information to cause more damage to the US government in a minute alone than anyone else has ever had in the history of the United States. But that's not his goal. [His] objective is to expose software that people around the world use without knowing what they are exposing themselves without consciously agreeing to surrender their rights to privacy. [He] has a huge number of documents that would be very harmful to the US government if they were made public. ~ Glenn Greenwald

America must have a greater commitment to justice than it does simply to the law. ~ Edward Snowden

We have got a CIA station just up the road - the consulate here in Hong Kong - and I am sure they are going to be busy for the next week. And that is a concern I will live with for the rest of my life, however long that happens to be. ~ Edward Snowden

Snowden is almost preternaturally prepossessing and self-possessed. I think of a novelist whose dream character just walks into his or her head. It must have been like that with you and Snowden. But what if he'd been a graying guy with the same documents and far less intelligent things to say about them? In other words, how exactly did who he was make your movie and remake our world? ~ Laura Poitras

A zero-day exploit is a method of hacking a system. It's sort of a vulnerability that has an exploit written for it, sort of a key and a lock that go together to a given software package. It could be an internet web server. It could be Microsoft Office. It could be Adobe Reader or it could be Facebook. ~ Edward Snowden

Edward Snowden, who worked for Booz Allen Hamilton, professes to have had access to whatever he wanted to know about anyone's anything. If he's telling the truth, why does he have such permeability without any government oversight? Is that OK with you? ~ Henry Rollins

America should be cooling down the tensions in the internet, making it a more trusted environment, making it a more secure environment, making it a more reliable environment, because that's the foundation of our economy and our future. ~ Edward Snowden

And so the geek inherited the earth. ~ Edward Snowden

I wanted to fight in the Iraq war because I felt like I had an obligation as a human being to help free people from oppression. ~ Edward Snowden

I know the media likes to personalize political debates, and I know the government will demonize me. ~ Edward Snowden

We reject techniques like torture regardless of whether they're effective or ineffective because they are barbaric and harmful on a broad scale. It's the same thing with cyber warfare. We should never be attacking hospitals. We should never be taking down power plants unless that is absolutely necessary to ensure our continued existence as a free people. ~ Edward Snowden

Ask yourself: if I were a Chinese spy, why wouldn't I have flown directly into Beijing? I could be living in a palace petting a phoenix by now. ~ Edward Snowden

He [Edward Snowden] has been careful with his info, doling it out to responsible news organizations - The Post, the New York Times, the Guardian, etc. - and not tossing it up in the air, WikiLeaks style, and echoing the silly mantra "Information wants to be free." (No. Information, like most of us, wants a home in the Hamptons.)" – Richard Cohen, Washington Post (10/22/2013) ~ Richard Cohen

Privacy is a function of liberty. ~ Edward Snowden

There have been times throughout American history where what is right is not the same as what is legal. Sometimes to do the right thing you have to break the law. ~ Edward Snowden

We need to make sure that whenever we're engaging in a cyber-warfare campaign, a cyber-espionage campaign in the United States, that we understand the word cyber is used as a euphemism for the internet, because the American public would not be excited to hear that we're doing internet warfare campaigns, internet espionage campaigns, because we realize that we ourselves are impacted by it. ~ Edward Snowden

We have to be able to reject disproportionate and unjustified responses in the cyber domain just as we do in the physical domain. ~ Edward Snowden

I don't think Edward Snowden deserves a death penalty or life in prison. I think that's inappropriate. I think that's why he fled, [because] that is what he faced. ~ Rand Paul

US spend more on research and development than the other countries, so we shouldn't be making the internet a more hostile, a more aggressive territory. ~ Edward Snowden

Congress hasn't declared war on the countries - the majority of them are our allies - but without asking for public permission, NSA is running network operations against them that affect millions of innocent people. And for what? So we can have secret access to a computer in a country we're not even fighting? ~ Edward Snowden