HANNOVER, Germany – I had the opportunity to attend a live interview at CeBit15 with Glen Greenwald (in person) and Edward Snowden (via video link). Their commentary on the state of security today and in the future continue to shed light on U.S. national security concerns and information gathering practices.
The session began with Glen Greenwald, Snowden’s self-professed gatekeeper. Why “gatekeeper” you might say? He considers himself the gatekeeper of the documents Snowden has shared with him – the one who decides what should and shouldn’t be shared. He said it would be detrimental to share everything and potentially cause irreparable harm to innocent individuals, and believes the world is a better place as a result of sharing the information on the level of spying and lying conducted by the NSA. And now that the general public understands how the Internet has been used as a mass surveillance tool, democratic debate on this topic is happening that wasn’t happening previously. OK, so none of this is news, let’s move on.
On to the Snowden part of the discussion, which I found much more interesting. He touched on some of the same points as Greenwald, but from a bit of a different angle. As far as democratic discussion goes, that is what he said his goal was in releasing the material. It was not simply about letting everyone know there is surveillance, it was about letting everyone know that there needed to be some democratic discussion on this topic to determine the right level of surveillance and what should truly be considered classified information. He gave an example that was truly amazing, but unfortunately not surprising. At the NSA, your job title, phone number, location and project focus are considered classified information. This information is required in your signature block on your e-mails, and therefore, every e-mail sent is classified. So, if the department is meeting for pizza down the street at 1 p.m. and they e-mail to organize it, it’s marked classified. Shock and awe and what a waste of resources. So what truly should and shouldn’t be classified? I’m all for a discussion on this.
Snowden also reiterated that Germany won’t give him asylum because the U.S. will be outraged, but he followed up to say it’s not about wanting to come to Germany, he wants to go home to the U.S. He wants to find a way to be able to go back to the U.S. even if it means some prison time. Given he is charged under an anti-Espionage act, there is no opportunity to explain why he did what he did as part of a trial discussion. But he doesn’t regret what he’s done, “I burned my life to the ground and I’d do it again,” said Snowden.
One point he added at the end, which I thought was really the most revelatory statement he made, was about security vs. surveillance. If individuals and companies had adequate security practices and technology in place, this level of surveillance would not have been possible. That is the topic he says needs to be discussed – security, not surveillance. I couldn’t agree more.
In another session at CeBit, I had the opportunity to hear Michael George speak on similar topics. George is a former German anti-espionage agent and author of “Hacked: How Network Attacks Threaten Us All.” He touched on Snowden’s actions and talked about how the main outcome as a result of these actions is that society has lost its trust in technology. Technology is no longer viewed as good, but with skepticism. He was adamant that Germany does not use the spying techniques exposed as standard NSA activities. There was also discussion around future no-spy agreements and the fact that it isn’t a reality to expect such agreements. Potentially on specific topics, such as economics, but no government would give up the possibility to spy if they felt it was warranted. Given espionage is the second-oldest profession, it sounds like a pretty solid theory.
The world has changed as a result of Snowden’s actions and that is good. But I disagree that it’s an all or nothing discussion. There needs to be a happy medium of surveillance that is more transparent and lets governments keep their citizens safe without an invasion of privacy to their daily lives. Which I might add is already pretty well covered by anyone who’s on social media.
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Claudia Bacco, Managing Director – EMEA for RCR Wireless News, has spent her entire career in telecom, IT and security. Having experience as an operator, software and hardware vendor and as a well-known industry analyst, she has many opinions on the market. She’ll be sharing those opinions along with ongoing trend analysis for RCR Wireless News.
