Do you feel the same about Snowden or the other WikiLeaks dumps? I am not accusing you of being in this camp, but the conventional wisdom at that time was that information should be released as soon as possible with no redactions, even if doing so risked the lives of agents in the field
> conventional wisdom at that time was that information should be released as soon as possible with no redactions, even if doing so risked the lives of agents in the field
Actually I feel very differently about these two things specifically because Snowden didn't just blindly dump everything he could get regardless of the consequences.
It is very unfortunate. Snowden is no hero. What he revealed was abhorrent, and should have never occurred. He did right by the world in revealing what he did. But it was reckless. It was sloppy. It was "baby with the bathwater" in such a way that the lives of those in the field were at risk. And then he fucked right off to Russia, where similar and worse activities are undertaken by that government.
So he revealed a terrible fact in an irresponsible way, and then sought asylum in a country which shits on human rights left and right. And this isn't whataboutism, it is an expectation for consistency in morals
> Snowden didn't just blindly dump everything he could get regardless of the consequences.
Snowden leaked information about NSA surveillance of foreign persons not on US soil - that kind of activity is explicitly within the NSA's core mission and the legal framework around it. I'll leave aside any debate of the domestic programs - he very definitely did expose entirely legal secret activities. That's either careless or malicious.
I’m honestly not sure if I missed something. I’ve been under the impression that he gave all the files to journalists and let them be the judge of what’s relevant. Sometimes things go beyond domestic vs international - because it’s someone else’s domestic surveillance and if that someone is an ally it’s at least a tiny bit problematic and worthy of review.
> I’ve been under the impression that he gave all the files to journalists and let them be the judge of what’s relevant.
That would mean he wasn't careful at all, having outsourced the selection of what data to make public to a 3rd party.
> Sometimes things go beyond domestic vs international - because it’s someone else’s domestic surveillance and if that someone is an ally it’s at least a tiny bit problematic and worthy of review.
Everybody does this with everyone, allies and enemies alike, and doing so is a matter of state foreign policy. This type of activity is exactly what the NSA is charted for. We've reviewed this stuff in writing the laws that charter the agency and govern it's activity.
Snowden revealed warrantless wiretapping of US citizens, not just foreign nationals. Unlike WikiLeaks he reviewed each document before release to attempt to minimize harm.
I'm not sure why you're bringing up a completely tangential topic, even as you seemingly agree with the core point I made: Snowden revealed information about completely and indisputably legal intelligence activities.
I rather think that revealing that our government is violating our 4th amendment rights is worth whatever minor harm it may have done to our ability to spy on our allies. I don't think you can reveal something like PRISM being used domestically without also revealing it's non-domestic applications. You think foreign intelligence agencies can't do the math on what it means for the NSA to have unfettered access to places like Google?
Also legal does not mean moral.
Your free to disagree, but my opinion is that Snowden did the American people a public service, and put clear effort into minimizing the damage. It's not some unambiguous knight in shining armor situation, but more of a shades of grey situation where in my opinion the good outweighed the harm.
Snowden and WikiLeaks were about data that is much more highly classified and is in a different league. My reading of the Twitter Files is that they are process oriented (this is how those decisions were made, these are the decisions that were made and may not have been obvious to the casual observer). The thing with the Twitter Files is they are so obviously PR-driven. Snowden and Wikileaks were doing political releases because those people/orgs believed the underlying data showed prevarication by people like General Hadley at the NSA and potential crimes within the US armed forces that needed public scrutiny.
> the conventional wisdom at that time was that information should be released as soon as possible with no redactions
That was very much not the conventional wisdom at the time. This choice by Wikileaks was hugely controversial and in stark contrast with Snowden’s leaks, which were published by journalists after having been analysed, filtered and redacted. Citing Snowden and Wikileaks as if they operated in the same way is simply wrong.
And yes, just dumping stuff without at least checking them is morally and practically wrong. If only because it makes you very likely to take part voluntarily or not in disinformation campaigns if you’re fed false documents.
As someone else said, Snowden pawned off the responsibility to redact and protect to a group of journalist with no subject matter expertise. It was a reckless and irresponsible choice. If anyone in the chain of custody knew what to redact to protect those in the field, it was Snowden. But he chose to abdicate that responsibility to journalists.
That was the sensible decision, as he was too close to the material. He would bear more responsibility than he already did, yes, but it would also look partial and one-sided. Investigative journalists know how to handle this kind of material and have training and experience. Snowden very much did not.
