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Comment by MichaelApproved | Hacker News Reader

To add to your comment, he took an enormous amount of data. It was sweeping and pretty indiscriminate. And he gave it to the media.

Some of what he took and shared could be legitimately argued as whistle blowing but there's lots of other classified data about legitimate programs that was taken as well.

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Isn't the more important point whether or not he exposed serious corruption and illegal activity? We forgive the police breaking the law, in order to enforce it, all the time.. the classic example of speeding to catch a speeder.

It seems disingenuous to focus on the collateral damage of his action and ignore the main target. We forgive our military their collateral damage all the time as an unfortunate side effect of pursuing a noble mission. Shouldn't he be afforded the same?

> Isn't the more important point whether or not he exposed serious corruption and illegal activity? We forgive the police breaking the law, in order to enforce it, all the time.. the classic example of speeding to catch a speeder.

But...that's not breaking the law. When speeding is done as part of the police officer's job, it is not breaking the law.

In contrast, when a police officer speeds while not carrying out their duty, that is indeed breaking the law. The Pulitzer Prize for Public Service in 2013 was awarded to an investigation that uncovered illegally speeding cops: http://www.pulitzer.org/winners/7180

>But...that's not breaking the law. When speeding is done as part of the police officer's job, it is not breaking the law.

What about the FBI running a honey pot where they continue to allow children to be abused? Technically legal, but is it really something we should tolerate?

> that's not breaking the law. When speeding is done as part of the police officer's job, it is not breaking the law.

By definition, whistleblowing is disclosing information that shouldn't be disclosed.This is why there needs to be whistleblower protection: so that the "illegal" action is no longer considered illegal but a civic duty.

> The Pulitzer Prize for Public Service in 2013 was awarded to an investigation that...

Funny you should mention that, in 2014, the Pulitzer Prize for Public Service was awarded to journalists who worked with material illegally provided by Edward Snowden: http://www.pulitzer.org/winners/7200

I think this is the key issue that really muddies the Snowden issue.

I completely agree with Snowden's leaking of the domestic spying program information, but he also leaked a lot of information not related to that. Foreign spying is basically what the NSA is supposed to do.

Did he also leak information about spying on enemies? Or only about spying on allies?

Both, and that's the key issue. Here's an example:

http://www.scmp.com/news/hong-kong/article/1266875/exclusive...

And he gave it to the media.

That makes it sound like he dumped it indiscriminately.

Which is very misleading.

Can you give an example?

He cannot, because any sensitive data that is not in the public's interest, to be made public, has not been.

>The American government conducted a major intelligence offensive against China, with targets including the Chinese government and networking company Huawei, according to documents from former NSA worker Edward Snowden that have been viewed by SPIEGEL and the New York Times

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/nsa-spied-on-chine...

>Research by SPIEGEL reporters in Berlin and Washington, talks with intelligence officials and the evaluation of internal documents of the US' National Security Agency and other information, most of which comes from the archive of former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, lead to the conclusion that the US diplomatic mission in the German capital has not merely been promoting German-American friendship. On the contrary, it is a nest of espionage. From the roof of the embassy, a special unit of the CIA and NSA can apparently monitor a large part of cellphone communication in the government quarter. And there is evidence that agents based at Pariser Platz recently targeted the cellphone that Merkel uses the most.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/cover-story-how-...

Well, I suppose it's in China's and Germany's interests, but doing things like that that benefit another country at the expense of your own is generally called treason.

It's sort of amazing that treason is a still a charge that can be levelled. Seeing the word outside the context of a 18th century history (or earlier) still catches me, and with Snowden it's hardly recent news.

It may generally be called treason by some people, but in the US the definition of the crime of treason is specifically constrained to avoid abuses.

>Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.

Revealing national security secrets to Enemies doesn't count as Aid?

If you want to apply that test naively then you need to hold David Petraeus, Scooter Libby, Robert Novak, and a whole host of others to the same standard. Snowden didn't "reveal national security secrets to enemies" he revealed them to the press. He may have made it possible for so-called enemies to learn things they didn't already know, but even that is debatable. Define "Aid" and "Enemies" however you like, but apply the definitions consistently if you want to be taken seriously.

Is China an enemy of the US? They're certainly not at war, and are the worlds biggest trading partners. I don't know the answer, just pointing out that it's not obvious.

From http://www.heritage.org/constitution/#!/articles/3/essays/11...

In Cramer v. United States (1945), the Supreme Court held that a specific intent—adherence to the enemy, and therefore to harm the United States—is necessary, rather than the simple rendition of aid.

Listening in on Merkel's phone calls. Yes, an ally of the US but allies spy on each other all the time and have and will for all time. Was it illegal? That's a hard no. Was it immoral? That's an interesting debate.

Edit: Though I did appreciate her Captain Renault impression about being so terribly shocked that as head of state she was a target for espionage.

> Was it illegal? That's a hard no.

It was illegal under German law. Should we ignore the laws of our close allies?

Whether or not we should, it later came out that they were doing the same to us.

If I were a German taxpayer and the BND weren't spying on the US I would want a refund.

Being a foreign spy is always illegal. That's the point of it, and why spies are separate from soldiers and police.

He doesn't have to. Both Snowden and Glenn Greenwald have acknowledged both that there are documents in the Snowden tranche that are not in the public interest to disclose, and that all the documents had not been reviewed before being turned over to reporters.

So you're saying you have no examples, and that the only people privy to any supposed non-public-interest disclosure were the journalists at a few major newspapers.

No, that is not what I said.

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