Those working within the system should follow Snowden's example, IMHO. Force the government to either stop these practices altogether, or reveal their true cost to the American way of life.
Snowden did it, and look what happened. Nothing. Sad truth is, the majority don't care. If they did, then it would be reflected in voting, and things would change. But no. Mean while, Snowden is a wanted man in exile.
Don't get me wrong, I don't like this one little bit, but it seems I'm in a minority.
1) The bad is that the average person didn't seem to be outraged enough to do anything or they were outraged but incapable of doing anything. That is not even the bad part. The bad part is that NSA and others have learned that even with such obvious things people are powerless. They will likely ramp up their capabilities in the future.
2) The good thing is that we are discussing it and some who create and are knowledgeable about security and technology have started developing and enhancing their tools. Because a lot of the techniques are open now. We can defend better from them.
Sometimes tools created by a few can be used by the large population. That is a nice side effects.
Notice "us" vs "them". I think that is how "they" see the situation and how we should see it. It is a war between the American public and the NSA so to speak. It is important to keep this adversarial position because the other side already has that position.
It is also important to mention NSA is not monolithic and talking about "it" vs "us" is not quite accurate. Many decisions are probably made based on bureaucratic concerns -- sunk costs, contractor kickbacks and so on, rather than some inherent evil conspiratorial cabal. But for the propaganda domain, I think it is effective in portraying it that way. Because looking at its behavior as a whole it kind of exhibits those traits.
edit: grammar&typo
"Nothing" understates the impact. Sure, no one insider's revelations alone will suffice to radically change the situation, but, to borrow a Medieval adaptation of a classical aphorism, gutta cavet lapidem, non vi, sed saepe cadendo.
http://www.politico.com/story/2014/09/techs-surveillance-hop... "The Senate fled Washington last week without taking action on a bill to rein in the National Security Agency’s bulk data collection, a measure that topped the industry’s agenda after Edward Snowden’s leaks about the NSA’s expansive snooping programs..."
Publicly, that is all that happened.
Within the NSA, I imagine there was quite a bit of upheaval. Most importantly, the entire system was redesigned so as to prevent the same thing from happening again.
If you read Julian Assange's early essays State and Terrorist Conspiracies, you'll see the inspiration for Wikileaks and the explanation of the strategic and tactical value of leaking: It breaks the bonds of trust within state organizations, preventing them from starting and executing programs their conspiracies (anything within the NSA is by definition a conspiracy; security clearances are conspiracies writ large).
Imagine the impact if the NSA became mistrustful of itself! Truly it is a vision worth leaking for.
The game is much longer that a couple of individual leakers.