Who is really a snowman. Edward Snowden celebrates five years of his forced emigration

Snowden's story is known as a real detective story that took place in June 2013 in front of the whole world. An employee of the American National Security Agency (NSA) was hiding from his all-powerful employer and government, changing countries and planes until he settled in Russia.

Read also in the latest issue:

the true story of Mother Teresa;

family tree and history of the Efremov dynasty.

Fugitive and paranoid

Having stolen from the NSA more than a million secret files proving surveillance of billions of users around the world, Snowden flew to Hong Kong to tell the truth to journalists from the British The Guardian and the American Washington Post and hide from the authorities of his country.

The footage of how the meeting took place at The Mira Hotel formed the basis of the Citizenfour documentary (this is the name - "Citizen Four" - Ed chose for himself to start communicating with journalists through encrypted e-mail messages). When did the real meeting, the ex-NSA agent struck the interlocutors with the total and, as it seemed to them, ridiculous conspiracy on which he insisted. Working with a laptop under a dark raincoat and a video camera taped on it looked like an extreme form of paranoia. However, after Snowden's information became public, a huge number of users in the world glued their eyes to their computers, and the filmmakers during the editing in Berlin turned off all electronic devices in the room and hid mobile phones if they had to tell each other something even partially confidential.Ed himself has long preferred a smartphone conventional push-button cell phone.

The influence of the United States in the world, although exaggerated by Russian propaganda, is nevertheless undeniably great. In trying to arrest Snowden, the pressure was unprecedented and phenomenally brazen. To get a fugitive agent, the States turn on all their levers. Upon learning that the fugitive is in Hong Kong, they convey a demand to immediately detain him and extradite him to the United States. Snowden left the hotel and disappeared from view: as it turned out later, he took refuge with refugees from the Philippines and Sri Lanka. Local authorities are clearly playing for time: on the one hand, they refer to inaccuracies in the request from America, on the other hand, they make it clear that Snowden will not receive asylum in Hong Kong.

The ex-agent takes tickets to Havana via Moscow. Breathing a sigh of relief, the Hong Kong authorities allow him to fly out on June 23rd. Hysteria reigns in the American intelligence services: it turns out that the United States, which raised the ears of the entire diplomatic corps to catch the impudent bespectacled man, did not themselves do such a simple procedure as canceling his passport.

The document is canceled when Edward is already in the air on his way to Moscow. teeming with journalists, but Snowden is nowhere to be found. For a connecting flight to Havana, the press is snapping up tickets to fly with him, but the plane leaves without the fugitive: Seat 17A, where he checked in, is left empty, and frustrated wits can only create a Twitter account on behalf of the empty seat and “report”. It turns out that the US government put pressure on Cuba, and she telegraphed to Moscow that she would not allow landing on Aeroflot if Snowden was on it.

And the 29-year-old guy, who found himself, almost like the hero of "The Extraordinary Adventures of Italians in Russia", between heaven and earth, spends five weeks in the Sheremetyevo transit zone.

Snowden is not the first and not the last: the six most famous captives of airport transit zones

Russia is also not happy with the disturber of world peace that has suddenly fallen on it, as Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov signals to his "partners". During this time, the car of the ambassador of Ecuador is noticed at the airport (this country at that time provided asylum to the founder of WikiLeaks, Julian Assange, who actively worked for Snowden).

And in early July, Bolivian President Evo Morales arrives in Moscow for a gas forum. Answering journalists' questions, Morales expresses his readiness to provide Edward with asylum. On the night of July 3, he flies back to his homeland, but Portugal, France, Italy, Spain close the airspace for the presidential plane, and he forcibly lands in Vienna. Morales' plane is being searched there.

The unprecedented humiliation and violation of all basic diplomatic rules, however, does not give a result: the desired "Citizen Four" is not on board. Snowden agrees to Putin's condition "to stop his work aimed at harming our American partners, no matter how strange it sounds from my lips," and remains in Russia.

Human rights activist and philosopher

Snowden is, to put it mildly, an unusual person for the world of special services. In this environment, it is customary to strictly obey discipline, not to give free rein to their own ideas about the correctness / incorrectness and the legality / illegality of what they are doing. Recruitment, repurchase of scouts, double agents - the other side of the coin, but also a classic of the genre for a long time. But Snowden...

Seeing that the secret American PRISM system allows the US authorities to access the personal correspondence (e-mail, sms, calls, messages on social networks, search queries) of any person in the world with almost the click of a button, he thought about how this corresponds ethics and what global consequences in the relationship between a citizen and power can lead to.

Formally, PRISM was created to fight terrorism. Snowden, from his experience at the NSA, was convinced that access to the bases is constantly used for completely different purposes: near-diplomatic blackmail, providing the United States with advantages at meetings of the G7 / Eight / Twenty. With the help of PRISM, businessmen, diplomats, presidents, and unfaithful spouses are monitored. The system makes it too easy to find out about everyone's weaknesses, and all global IT players (Microsoft, Apple, Google, Facebook, YouTube) turned out to be part of it and collect information about us. In recent years, Snowden has repeatedly accused Facebook of spying on users.

We carry sensors in our pockets that track our location wherever we go… Only privacy allows us the freedom to decide who we are and who we want to be,” Snowden told British Channel 4, which chose him as the hero of the project “Alternative Christmas message” in December 2013.

This type of discrimination is a violation of fundamental rights. But more and more countries, not just the US, are doing it. I wanted to give society a chance to decide for itself where it will draw its boundaries,” he confirmed his beliefs in 2017 in an interview with Spiegel.

In total, it was then about 35 states in which such systems operate. It would be naive to believe that the Russian special services are not trying to do something similar. Attempts by Roskomnadzor to put the Runet under strict control, to store information only on Russian servers, are evidence of this. The reason is the same - the mantra about the need to fight terrorism. It is no coincidence that Pavel Durov, the founder of VKontakte and Telegram, squeezed out of Russia, is trying to answer the question posed by Snowden today, creating communication systems independent of governments.

Snowden is smart and well-read. Interested in philosophy and Buddhism. Agnostic. A man with a rod: he staked a salary of 200 thousand dollars a year, peace of mind, freedom and even life, only for humanity to understand that Orwellian 1984 is finally on the threshold. But this core of his is still not clear to everyone.

“Snowden is not a traitor. He did not betray the interests of his country, he did not pass on information to another country that would harm its people. But if they asked me whether this [what he did] was right or not, my answer is no, ”said Vladimir Putin in an interview with Oliver Stone, who shot a feature film based on this whole epic. As the president of a country pitted against the US, Putin must have taken satisfaction in the failure of the NSA. But as a scout, he can neither accept nor understand such an act. The most unpleasant thing for him would be the appearance of the Russian snowden.

The break in the pattern is also felt by Ed. On the one hand, Russia saved and sheltered him. On the other hand, this is clearly not the country whose image correlates with his beliefs. He is eager to continue social activities, but all attempts to change the place of deployment, for example, to Switzerland, have so far failed.

Edward is now 36. His residence permit in Russia has been extended until 2020. He secretly lives somewhere among us, his parents and girlfriend Lindsay Mills regularly visit him. He already speaks good Russian, and according to the lawyer, he goes to museums, theaters, and travels. Things turned out less rosy for Assange: seven years of isolation in a room at the embassy in London, and in the end he was still arrested. Colleague Ed called the day of Julian's arrest "a black day for freedom of the press."

Captured information war general: what awaits Julian Assange

Under American law, Edward Snowden is a criminal. But for the freedom-loving people of the new generation, he is undoubtedly the hero of our time. Six months ago, 500 seats in the lecture hall of the Sorbonne were taken by Parisian students within three minutes after it became known that the rebel agreed to speak via video link from Moscow. And overboard there were 7000 more interested persons.

Will Snowden ever be revered in America, like, for example, Martin Luther King, who broke the previous unjust system, or will he remain a traitor who brought rubbish out of the hut? Time will tell.

Edward Joseph Snowden is a former Central Intelligence Agency and National Security Agency officer. June 2013 Edward Snowden handed over classified information to the NSA to the media. Thanks to this, the whole world has learned that American intelligence agencies are spying on information communications between citizens of states around the world, using existing information and communication networks.

The US authorities charged Edward Snowden in absentia with embezzlement of government property, disclosure of national defense data and willful transfer of classified information to unauthorized persons.

Biography of Snowden

Studied computer science at a college in Maryland. Since 2003, he served in the US armed forces, leaving them after a severe leg injury during exercises.

After his military service, he began working for the NSA, guarding a secret facility on the campus of the University of Maryland. In this job, Edward Snowden received a Top Secret/Sensitive Compartmented Information security clearance.

After the NSA, Edward Snowden got a job in the information security department of the CIA. From March 2007 to February 2009, he worked under the diplomatic cover of the US Permanent Mission in (Geneva).

In 2009, Edward retired from government service and began working in consulting companies working with the NSA: Dell, and military contractor Booz Allen Hamilton (at his last job he worked for less than 3 months).

Edward Snowden says that during his service he gradually became disillusioned with her: “I realized that I am part of something that does much more harm than good” (from an interview with The Guardian).

At some point, he came to the conclusion that soon the process of creating an NSA surveillance network would become irreversible. “You can't wait for someone else to take action. I was looking for leaders, but I realized that leadership is about being the first to act.” “I don’t consider myself a hero because I act in my own interests: I don’t want to live in a world where there is no privacy, and therefore there is no room for intellectual research and creativity.”

Snowden's press collaboration

In January 2013, Edward Snowden wrote an anonymous email to Laura Poitras, a former film producer and co-founder of the Freedom of the Press Foundation. Snowden told Poitras that he had important classified information. He soon contacted The Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald and publicist Barton Gellman, who wrote for the Washington Post.

Snowden corresponded with journalists via encrypted e-mail messages. In the second half of May 2013, Snowden began passing key information about the PRISM program to Greenwald and Gellman, but asked not to disclose it immediately.

Secrets from Snowden

Big Brother is watching...

One of the most impressive data released thanks to Snowden was the data on the PRISM program. It includes mass surveillance by American intelligence agencies of the negotiations between Americans and foreign citizens via telephone and the Internet.

PRISM allows the NSA to view email, listen to voice and video chats, view photos and videos, track files, and get social network updates. The PRISM program is attended by corporations whose software products or gadgets are used by hundreds of millions of people around the world: Microsoft (Hotmail), (Google Mail), Yahoo!, AOL, Apple and Paltalk.

Diplomats under the hood

Also, thanks to Snowden, it became known that the UK intelligence services monitored computers and intercepted phone calls of foreign politicians and officials who participated in the G20 summit in London in 2009. Secret work was carried out by the UK Government Communications Center and the US NSA. In addition, British intelligence agencies intercepted telephone conversations of the President of Russia during the summit.

Flight from the USA

On May 20, 2013, Snowden took a leave of absence from work and flew to Hong Kong. There, from the hotel, he continued email correspondence with journalists. On June 6, 2013, Snowden told journalist Gellman: "The police visited my home in Hawaii this morning." On the same day, with his permission, the Washington Post and The Guardian published exposés of the PRISM program.
On June 9, Snowden invited journalists to Hong Kong for an interview. This video interview and his real name were released by The Guardian at his own request.
On June 22, 2013, it became known that the US State Department appealed to the Hong Kong authorities with a demand to detain Snowden and extradite him to the United States. The Hong Kong authorities refused to do so, citing an incorrectly formatted request.

Snowden in Russia

On June 23, 2013, as reported in the media, Snowden, accompanied by Sarah Harrison, a representative of WikiLeaks, arrived at Moscow's Sheremetyevo Airport. According to the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ecuador, on the evening of June 23, Snowden asked for asylum of this state (recall that Julian Assange, another debunker of American secrets, is already hiding in the embassy of this state in London). However, Snowden did not fly to either Ecuador or Venezuela, whose president announced his readiness to grant him political asylum.
On June 30, Snowden asked for political asylum in Russia. Sarah Harrison, who accompanied him, filed the relevant documents. A week later, it became known that Edward Snowden sent applications for political asylum to almost 20 states. Bolivia, Venezuela and Nicaragua responded positively.
On July 12, Snowden held a meeting in the Sheremetyevo transit zone, where he had been living all this time, with representatives of international human rights organizations, some State Duma deputies and lawyers Anatoly Kucherena, Genrikh Padva and Henry Reznik. At the meeting, Snowden announced that he was asking for temporary asylum in Russia, and later plans to settle in Latin America.
On July 16, Snowden formally applied for temporary asylum in Russia.
On July 24, 2013, lawyer Anatoly Kucherena said that Snowden wants to stay in Russia forever, find a job here and has already begun to learn Russian.

Edward Snowden gained worldwide fame after a series of revealing articles about the total surveillance of American intelligence agencies over citizens of various states through special computer programs. The articles were based on classified documents that Snowden was able to obtain while working for the NSA (National Security Agency) and the CIA as a special agent, system administrator and analyst.

Biography of Edward Snowden

Edward Snowden was born on June 21, 1983 in the small town of Elizabeth City, located in North Carolina.

Edward's father's name is Lonnie Snowden. He served in the US Armed Forces, in the Coast Guard, and retired in 2009. Mother, Elizabeth Snowden, worked as a lawyer in the federal court of the city of Baltimore. Edward's older sister, Jessica, like their mother, has chosen a career as a lawyer, she works at the Washington Federal Judicial Center in the District of Columbia.

Ed Snowden became interested in computer science as a teenager, and after entering this specialty at Ann Arundel College (Maryland), he showed good results in his studies. However, obtaining a diploma was delayed, as several academic months were missed due to illness. After recovering, Edward managed to pass the final tests and he decided to continue his studies in the same direction. He chose online distance learning and in 2011 received a master's degree from the University of Liverpool.

Career

Edward Snowden began his career even before receiving a university degree. In 2004, he decided to go to fight in Iraq because, he said, he felt he had to help rid the people of Saddam's dictatorial regime. Edward began serving as a US Army reservist, but was unable to complete his military training prior to deployment to Iraq. The reason was a serious injury - Edward broke his legs during the testing of the training course.

After recovering, Edward received an offer to work for the NSA. Initially, it was the protection of classified facilities on the territory of the University of Maryland. Even then, Snowden was allowed access to information at the "Top Secret" and "Special Intelligence" levels.

This was followed by a promotion - Edward was transferred to the NSA base, located in Hawaii as a system administrator. He worked here until 2007, and even then he was collecting information, which later formed the basis of revelatory articles, although at that time there was still no plan for such actions.

This was followed by a two-year (from 2007 to 2009) period of service in the CIA in the information security department, where Snowden was instructed to monitor the security of computer networks.

In 2009, Edward left the CIA after receiving an offer from the American company Dell. Here he worked in the consulting department, including collaborating with the NSA. In the spring of 2013, Snowden again changes jobs, moving to the consulting service of military contractor Booz Allen Hamilton. Here he managed to work for only 3 months, before he decided on his most important step in life.

Snowden revelations

While working for the American intelligence agencies, Edward Snowden often encountered the methods of employees who disgusted his beliefs. Disillusionment with the activities of the NSA and the CIA began back in 2007, but he doubted for a long time whether he had the right to disclose information and whether this would harm other people even more. In addition, Edward had the hope that with the advent of Barack Obama, the situation in the country would change. When this did not happen, it was decided to act.

First, Edward contacted Laura Poitras, an American human rights activist and journalist who was involved in the creation of the Freedom of the Press Foundation (Freedom of the Press Foundation). Then he also wrote to Glenn Greenwald of the English newspaper The Guardian (The Guardian) and Barton Gellman, a publicist who collaborated with The Washington Post (Washington Post). All communication took place incognito and through a special cipher.

Edward began to transmit information while still in America, but asked to postpone publication. On May 20, he went on vacation and flew to Hong Kong, where he continued to correspond with reporters from his hotel room. Shortly after his arrival, Snowden discovered that the secret services were on his trail and then decided to speak openly about himself.

Snowden told reporters about this by inviting them to his hotel room. On the same day, The Washington Post and The Guardian published an extensive article about the government's PRISM program, aimed at the massive secret collection of data on people.

Edward gave journalists a video interview with permission to publish it. He decided not to hide his identity, as he was sure that he was not doing anything wrong, and it was the US special services that were violating the law.

In total, Snowden stole about 1.7 million secret files, but only 200,000 documents were handed over to journalists. This was done for security reasons - Edward clearly understood the boundaries of what was permissible and, first of all, tried not to harm anyone.

What is Snowden doing now?

Edward understood that once his identity was revealed, it would be necessary to seek asylum. He originally wanted to stay in Hong Kong, but the Chinese authorities turned him down. Agreed to accept Snowden Ecuador. However, on the way there, during a transfer at Sheremetyevo Airport, the American authorities canceled Edward's passport and he was unable to continue his journey.

On June 30, 2013, Snowden submitted a request for political asylum in Russia, which was soon approved.

The American government demanded the extradition of Snowden, but the Russian authorities refused, arguing that there were no such agreements and that Snowden did not commit any crimes on the territory of the Russian Federation. At the same time, a condition was put forward for Snowden - a refusal to commit any illegal actions against America.

Now Edward Snowden lives in Russia, without disclosing the exact location. However, he was noticed in Moscow, he also visited St. Petersburg and other Russian cities.

Snowden advises international IT corporations and speaks at conferences dedicated to the protection of private information. In 2018, Edward finished writing his memoir, available for purchase starting September 2019.

Attitude to the act of Edward Snowden

Snowden's revelations became an important milestone in the discussion about the admissibility of state interference in the private lives of citizens for the sake of security.

Edward himself said that he was prompted to such an act by the realization that children of the 21st century can grow up without any understanding of what privacy is. He was worried that this could have a devastating effect on each individual and on society as a whole.

Society itself reacted ambiguously to the incident. According to 2013 polls in the United States, only about 15% consider Snowden a hero, and more than half of those surveyed think that he is "something between a traitor and an informer." The dynamics is also interesting - in 2013, 21% of respondents called him “definitely a traitor”, and by 2016 the number of such answers increased to 30%.

Such figures show that people are getting used to the transparency of their own lives and the concept of personal boundaries is gradually blurred.

Edward Snowden is an American technical assistant, known throughout the world for the publication of a number of sensational revelations by the US intelligence agencies regarding mass surveillance of citizens. Since 2013, his name has appeared on the front pages of the media, as information about violations by the National Security Agency (NSA) of the rights and freedoms of millions of Americans and Europeans struck the world community.

Recently, Snowden has been living in Russia, where he was granted political asylum, as the United States put him on the international wanted list, charging him in absentia with embezzlement and disclosure of state secrets, which is regarded as a threat to the country's security.

Childhood and youth

Edward Snowden was born on June 21, 1983 in Elizabeth City, North Carolina. His parents, Coast Guard Lonnie and lawyer Elizabeth Snowden, are divorced. In the family, Edward is the youngest child, he has an older sister, Jessica, who works as a lawyer at the Federal Judicial Center in Washington.

Snowden's childhood and youth were spent in his hometown, where the future employee of the CIA and the US NSA received his secondary education. In 1999, the Snowden family moved to Maryland. There, Edward entered Ann Arundel College, where he took preparatory courses for university entrance.

However, due to health reasons, he never completed the course of study - he had to continue his studies remotely, which did not prevent Snowden from receiving a master's degree from the University of Liverpool in 2011.

In 2004, Edward Snowden went to serve in the US Armed Forces as a reservist, from where he was commissioned a few months after receiving a serious injury to both legs. From that moment on, Snowden's biography was directly related to computer science, programming and IT technologies, in which the guy showed professionalism and special talent, despite the lack of formal confirmation of the specialist's qualifications.

Service in the CIA

Edward Snowden's career climb was confident and swift. The specialist received his first professional skills at the NSA, working in the security structure of a secret facility at the University of Maryland. A few years later, Snowden was hired by the CIA and sent to Geneva under diplomatic cover as the US permanent representative to the UN. There, his responsibilities included the implementation of the security of computer networks. According to Edward, his work in Switzerland opened his eyes to the fact that he is a special link in the US intelligence services, bringing people more harm than good.

In 2009, the programmer quit the CIA and began working for NSA-affiliated consulting firms Dell and Booz Allen Hamilton as an outside contractor.

Snowden did not approve of the activities of the US National Security Agency, in the future, freeing the American public from illusions about the lawful actions of the government in relation to the whole world. In this regard, in 2013, the NSA special agent decided to act according to the dictates of his heart and reveal to people secret information that exposes American intelligence services in mass surveillance of people.

Snowden has repeatedly noted that he wanted to declassify the illegal actions of the NSA and the CIA back in 2008, but he hoped that with the coming to power, the situation in the US secret services would change. It soon became obvious to the programmer that the new US president continued the policy of his predecessors and did not intend to interfere with the activities of "spies".

Revelations and prosecutions

Snowden's work to declassify the crimes of American intelligence agencies started in 2013. Then the former CIA and NSA agent contacted film producer Laura Poitras, American journalist Glenn Greenwald and publicist Barton Gellman, whom he said that he was ready to provide classified information.

Snowden's communication took place through encrypted e-mail messages, through which the IT specialist leaked 200,000 secret documents to journalists. Their status of secrecy exceeded previously published materials on WikiLeaks regarding the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq. After that, a scandal erupted, and the announced compromising material received the effect of a thermonuclear bomb in the press. In the future, the founder of WikiLeaks, will declare that thanks to the international non-profit organization, Snowden remains at large.

Edward Snowden's revelations contained facts about US surveillance of the population in 60 countries of the world and 35 government departments throughout Europe. The programmer declassified information about the PRISM program, with the help of which special agents conducted mass surveillance of the negotiations between Americans and foreign citizens via the Internet and mobile communications.

According to Edward, the PRISM program allowed the NSA to eavesdrop on voice and video chats, view email and photos, monitor file transfers, and own all the information of social network users. A large number of popular services participated in this program: Microsoft (Hotmail), Facebook, Google (Gmail), Skype, Yahoo!, AOL, YouTube, Apple and Paltalk.

Also sensational in Snowden's exposure was a secret ruling by the FISC court, according to which the largest mobile operator Verizon is required to transmit metadata to the NSA on a daily basis of all calls made within the United States. Against the background of this decision, journalists suggested that other American cellular operators could also be involved in such obligations.

In addition, thanks to Snowden, it became known about the existence of the Tempora tracking program, which intercepts Internet traffic and telephone conversations, and about the integrated iPhone software that allows you to monitor user actions.

One of the most resonant revelations of Snowden was the disclosure of the fact that US intelligence agents intercepted telephone conversations of foreign politicians and officials who participated in the G20 summit, held in 2009 in London. The number of victims of misconduct by the US NSA included many well-known politicians from around the world.

According to the Pentagon, Snowden is in possession of 1.7 million classified documents, most of which concern vital information about the operations of the US Army and Navy, Marines and Air Force. This information, according to journalists, will be gradually disclosed in order to damage the national interests of the United States and the NSA.

After deciding to reveal his identity, Edward Snowden, realizing that he would have to pay dearly for this act, went on the run.

At first, the programmer was hiding in Hong Kong, where he planned to obtain political asylum. After the official accusation by the American authorities of embezzlement and disclosure of secret state secrets, which happened on the day of Edward's 30th birthday, the spy appeared in Moscow at the Sheremetyevo airport for unknown reasons, but, without a Russian visa, was forced to stay in the airport's transit zone .

According to media reports, in Russia, the programmer was met by a car with diplomatic plates of Venezuela, which took Snowden away in an unknown direction. Presumably, through Moscow, Edward intended to go to South America.

On June 30, 2013, he asked for political asylum in Russia, and the very next day the President of the Russian Federation allowed the programmer to stay in the country on the condition that he stop the subversive work of the American intelligence services.

At the same time, Edward Snowden filed a petition for pardon with the American authorities, citing the fact that he does not observe anything bad and illegal in his actions. The American authorities have a controversial attitude towards Snowden's revelations, believing that the programmer is obliged to stand trial because he gave out US state secrets. American intelligence officials consider the act of the former CIA and NSA officer tough and illegal, causing irreparable damage to the US intelligence service.

In turn, the European Union has a categorical attitude towards the issue of the prosecution of Snowden. The European Parliament has repeatedly called on the EU to refuse to impose a sentence on the American, to provide him with protection, which will make it impossible for him to be extradited to the United States or returned by a third party.

In July 2016, US CIA Director John Brennan said that Snowden should return to the US and stand trial. Then the head of the American foreign intelligence did not support the position of the former US Attorney General Eric Holder, who called Snowden's activities "a service to society." The head of the CIA does not believe that thanks to Edward, a discussion of socially significant issues began in the country.

In 2016, an ex-employee of the National Security Agency spoke in an interview with the Financial Times about his life in the Russian capital. Snowden admitted that his knowledge of the Russian language is only enough to make an order in a restaurant. Snowden added that he lives in Eastern North American Time and spends most of his time on the Internet, but "it was always like that in his life."

Snowden has repeatedly expressed his opinion on Russian anti-terrorism laws. A former employee of the American intelligence services criticized in his microblog on the social network "Twitter" a package of laws (“package”) that introduce life imprisonment for international terrorism and oblige telecom operators, instant messengers and social networks to store information about the facts of conversations and correspondence of users and their content.

“Mass surveillance does not work. This law robs every Russian of money and freedom without improving security. You should not sign it, ”Snowden notes.

In 2017, as before, the authorities of many countries of the world invite a former employee of the American intelligence services to speak on a number of issues, as well as to give lectures.

Movies

"The most wanted man in the world" Edward Snowden, after the publication and disclosure of classified information from the American intelligence services, became one of the main persons for writers and filmmakers who thought about making him part of their creations. He was the protagonist of the documentary Citizenfour, filmed by Laura Poitras based on an interview with an ex-CIA and NSA officer.

The film about Edward Snowden won the prestigious Oscar as the best documentary film with a bold plot, which from the first to the last seconds carries sensational revealing information.

In 2016, the world saw a new project by the famous director called Snowden, dedicated to the story of a former US IT specialist hiding from the evil American government. The main roles in the film were played by actors, and.

Personal life

The personal life of Edward Snowden after his high-profile revelations in view of the precautions taken has become a secret to society. He mentioned family life once in passing - in 2013 he said that he had a wife and children. It is known that since 2009 his girlfriend was dancer Lindsey Mills, with whom he lived in a civil marriage on the Hawaiian island of Waipahu.

There were rumors that in 2013 the couple broke up. But director Oliver Stone, the author of the film about Snowden, denied this information. The American spy still lives with his chosen one in Russia. This fact is also evidenced by their joint photos that appear on Lindsay's personal Instagram account.

In 2013, a former employee of the Russian special services proposed to Edward Snowden to marry her. She wrote about this on Twitter, but users called such a step on her part PR.

According to journalists who interviewed Edward in Hong Kong, Snowden remains a good-natured and intelligent person, in whose character notes of romance and idealism can be traced. The programmer leads a quiet and healthy lifestyle, practices Buddhism, spends a lot of time at the computer and enjoys reading books on the history of Russia. At the same time, the "whistleblower" of the NSA and the CIA adheres to a vegetarian diet, does not drink coffee and does not drink alcohol.

Edward Snowden now

Repeatedly, the programmer stated that he was ready to move to the United States, subject to an open trial with the presence of a jury. But no head of state has so far given Snowden such guarantees. In 2017, journalists suggested that Moscow would no longer hide Edward in Russia, but would extradite him to the new US president, but the programmer again managed to renew his residence permit.

In 2018, the American stopped public relations for a period of six months. In autumn, he participated in a videoconference with the University of Management in the Austrian city of Innsbruck. Edward said that he now manages the American Foundation for the Defense of the Freedom of Journalists.

As part of his activities, Snowden is developing a program that ensures the protection of information sources from external threats. According to the former CIA officer, he is primarily concerned about the problems of American society, with which he continues to struggle. At the same time, Edward does not stop criticizing the Russian government and reforms.

In November, Snowden lectured senior Mossad personnel, providing them via videoconference with evidence of NSA intrusion into Israeli intelligence operations. Snowden does not yet provide information about new speeches in 2019, but it is assumed that the programmer will continue to expose the American intelligence services.

Quotes

Snowden himself says this about his revelations:

“I carefully reviewed each document to make sure that its disclosure would serve the legitimate interests of the public. There are documents of all types that would have great consequences if they were released, but I do not release them because my goal is openness, not harm to people.”

“Would I be able to live peacefully knowing that every day billions of people in the world are under constant surveillance? Can I sleep at night if I have the resources to prevent this?

Oliver Stone in almost all his films, he takes political themes as a basis: the Kennedy assassination, September 11, wars, biographies of presidents, problems in the press, etc. "Snowden" This is a pseudo-documentary retelling of the life of a former INB technical special agent. Snowden made one of the biggest revelations in US history by releasing classified information about the total surveillance of citizens of America and other states.

The film is interesting in terms of giving the topic a wide eye. In it, two worlds collide with each other: freedom of choice and a sense of duty. Ed Snowden, unconditionally devoted to his country, is ready to justify the actions of the American government in any way and has been struggling with his fears and doubts for a long time, preferring to remain a “good boy” and continue to build a stunning career as an IT specialist. But sooner or later fate will bring him to a crossroads, and Snowden will be forced to decide which side he is on?

Edward Snowden allegedly opened the eyes of the world: no one is protected. Any door can be knocked on one day, whether you have broken the law or not - the suspicion of an offense gives the secret services the right to interrogate, search the house, seize personal belongings and establish closer surveillance. The film also clearly demonstrates the possibilities of the "all-seeing eye", which on a global scale looks after each of us wherever the crooked hand of civilization has reached - the Internet and cellular communications. It is no coincidence that the film shows Snowden's paranoid tendencies. If you think about it, it’s natural to get a slight shift in your psyche in his place, when you rotate daily in a system like INB, touch knowledge that mere mortals don’t know about, and, even worse, participate in a number of dubious operations. On this basis, it would be interesting to learn more about the secret programs "Vault", "Heartbeat", "Prism" and so on delve into the topic! The author does not disclose the details of the trip to Hong Kong, does not analyze the reasons for arriving in Russia, etc. In terms of information content, the film is completely based on Citizenfour. Snowden's truth, which was released in 2014, and does not add anything new from itself.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt organically got used to the image of a closed introvert. If the character Shaidlyn Woodley present as a collective image of all near-minded humanity, then she coped with the role perfectly. It is not clear why they included in the cast Nicolas Cage? Nondescript game on the background of a gray character. Other actors, however, were even less fortunate.

As a result we got a boring, drawn-out film that completely loses to the documentary chronicle Laura Poitras. Is Snowden's act justified in the eyes of ordinary Americans? Did the special agent show weakness or prove that any person has the right to his own choice? As an inveterate patriot, was he obliged to obediently serve his country until the end of his life? Sadly, the film does not bring us one step closer to answering these questions, forcing us only to make assumptions and exchange conflicting opinions. The author failed to penetrate into the "holy of holies" of his hero, did not reveal his inner state and did not convey through the film those experiences that the hero should be filled with at the decisive moment of the final action. The director rushes from side to side from one conclusion to another, changing his author's point of view several times. The director apparently does not have a clear position, and, alas, there was not enough time for everything else that could be said within the framework of the film.