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NSA leak journalist says more revelations on their way - CNN.com
(CNN) -- As U.S. federal agents build a case against the contractor who exposed controversial electronic surveillance programs by the National Security Agency, one of the journalists who has been working with him says more secrets are set to be revealed soon.
"There are extremely invasive spying programs that the public still does not know about that the NSA regularly engages in or other capabilities that they're developing," said Glenn Greenwald, a columnist for the Guardian, the British newspaper that broke the first story based on secret NSA documents.
"We are working on stories right at this moment that we think are very valuable for the public to know that don't in any way harm national security but that shine a light on this extremely secretive though momentous agency," he said in an interview with CNN's Christiane Amanpour on Monday.
Greenwald received the documents from Edward Snowden, a 29-year-old employee at the computer consultant Booz Allen Hamilton, a contractor for the U.S. electronic intelligence agency.
Snowden told the Guardian that he left behind his family and a six-figure job in Hawaii to reveal the extent of the NSA's collection of telephone and Internet data, which he called "an existential threat to democracy."
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Military analyst Daniel Ellsberg leaked the 7,000-page Pentagon Papers in 1971. The top-secret documents revealed that senior American leaders, including three presidents, knew the Vietnam War was an unwinnable, tragic quagmire. Further, they showed that the government had lied to Congress and the public about the progress of the war. Ellsberg surrendered to authorities and was charged as a spy. The court eventually learned that he was illegally wiretapped by the government and that President Nixon had ordered a break-in at the office of Ellsberg's psychiatrist in attempts to discredit him. All charges against the whistle-blower were dropped. Since then he has lived a relatively quiet life as a respected author and lecturer.
The Tuskegee syphilis experiment is often cited as the most famous example of unethical medical research. In 1932, the U.S. Public Health Service began studying untreated syphilis in black men who thought they were getting free health care. None of the patients was told of their affliction, and they weren't sufficiently treated. Peter Buxtun, who worked for the Public Health Service, relayed information about the experiment to a reporter in 1972, which halted the 40-year-long study. His testimony at congressional hearings led to an overhaul of the Health, Education and Welfare rules concerning work with human subjects. A class-action lawsuit was settled out-of-court for $10 million, with the U.S. government promising free medical care to surviving participants and their families. Here, Herman Shaw, one of the test subjects, appears with President Bill Clinton in 1997 during a ceremony apologizing to survivors and families of victims of the study.
In 2005, retired deputy FBI director Mark Felt revealed himself to be the whistle-blower "Deep Throat" in the Watergate scandal. He anonymously assisted Washington Post reporters Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward with many of their stories about the Nixon administration's cover-up after the June 1972 break-in at the Democratic National Committee headquarters. The stories sparked a congressional investigation that eventually led to President Nixon's resignation in 1974. The Post won a Pulitzer Prize for its coverage. Felt was convicted on unrelated conspiracy charges in 1980 and eventually pardoned by President Ronald Reagan before slipping into obscurity for the next quarter-century. He died in 2008 at age 95.
Mordechai Vanunu, who worked as a technician at Israel's nuclear research facility, leaked information to a British newspaper and led nuclear arms analysts to conclude that Israel possessed a stockpile of nuclear weapons. Israel has neither confirmed nor denied its weapons program. An Israeli court convicted Vanunu in 1986 after Israeli intelligence agents captured him in Italy. He was sentenced to 18 years in prison. Since his release in 2004, he has been arrested on a number of occasions for violating terms of his parole.
Mehdi Hashemi, an officer of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, opposed Iranian relations with the United States and acted to undermine an arms for hostages deal between the countries, even though senior Iranian officials supported it and carried it out. A secret and rogue operation carried out by an American military officer used the proceeds from weapons sales to Iran to fund the anti-communist Contras in Nicaragua and attempted to secure the release of U.S. hostages held by Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon. Hashemi leaked evidence of the deal to a Lebanese newspaper in 1986. President Ronald Reagan's closest aides maintain he did not fully know, and only reluctantly came to accept, the circumstances of what came to be known as the Iran-Contra affair. Here, Reagan addresses the media during a press conference at the White House in 1987.
Tobacco industry executive Jeffrey Wigand issued a memo to his company in 1992 about his concerns regarding tobacco additives. He was fired in March 1993 and subsequently contacted by "60 Minutes" and persuaded to tell his story on CBS. He claimed that Brown & Williamson knowingly used additives that were carcinogenic and addictive and spent millions covering it up. He also testified in a landmark case in Mississippi that resulted in a $246 billion settlement from the tobacco industry. Wigand has received public recognition for his actions and continues to crusade against Big Tobacco. He was portrayed by Russell Crowe in the 1999 film "The Insider."
For 10 years, Frederic Whitehurst complained mostly in vain about practices at the FBI's world-renowned crime lab, where he worked. His efforts eventually led to a 1997 investigation that found lab agents produced inaccurate and scientifically flawed testimony in major cases, including the Oklahoma City and World Trade Center bombings. The Justice Department recommended major reforms but also criticized Whitehurst for "overstated and incendiary" allegations. He also faced disciplinary action for refusing to cooperate with an investigation into how some of his allegations were leaked to a magazine. After a yearlong paid suspension he left the bureau in 1998 with a settlement worth more than $1.16 million.
FBI whistle-blower Coleen Rowley accused the bureau of hindering efforts to investigate a suspected terrorist that could have disrupted plans for the September 11, 2001, terror attacks. In 2002 she fired off a 13-page letter to FBI Director Robert Mueller and flew to Washington to hand-deliver copies to two members of the Senate Intelligence Committee and meet with committee staffers. The letter accused the bureau of deliberately undermining requests to look into Zacarias Moussaoui, the only person convicted in the United States of playing a role in the attacks. She testified in front of Congress and the 9/11 Commission about the FBI's mishandling of information. Rowley was selected as one of Time magazine's People of the Year in 2002, along with whistle-blowers Sherron Watkins of Enron and Cynthia Cooper of WorldCom.
Sherron Watkins, a former vice president at Enron, sent an anonymous letter to founder Kenneth Lay in 2001 warning him the company had accounting irregularities. The memo eventually reached the public and she later testified before Congress about her concerns and the company's wrongdoings. More than 4,000 Enron employees lost their jobs, and many also lost their life savings, when the energy giant declared bankruptcy in 2001. Investors lost billions of dollars. An investigation in 2002 found that Enron executives reaped millions of dollars from off-the-books partnerships while violating basic rules of accounting and ethics. Many were sentenced to prison for their roles in the Enron scandal.
Cynthia Cooper and her team of auditors uncovered massive fraud at WorldCom in 2002. They found that the long-distance telephone provider had used $3.8 billion in questionable accounting entries to inflate earnings over the past five quarters. By the end of 2003, the total fraud was estimated to be $11 billion. The company filed for bankruptcy protection and five executives ended up in prison. Cooper started her own consulting firm and told her story in the book "Extraordinary Circumstances: Journey of a Corporate Whistleblower." WorldCom President and CEO Bernard Ebbers, right, answers questions from the media during a press conference in 1999.
In 2003, federal air marshal Robert MacLean anonymously tipped off an MSNBC reporter that because of budget concerns, the TSA was temporarily suspending missions that would require marshals to stay in hotels just days after they were briefed about a new "potential plot" to hijack U.S. airliners. The news caused an immediate uproar on Capitol Hill and the TSA retreated, withdrawing the scheduling cuts before they went into effect. MacLean was later investigated and fired for the unauthorized disclosure of "sensitive security information."
Joe Darby is the whistle-blower behind the Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal in Iraq. He says he asked Army Reserve Spc. Charles Graner Jr. for photos from their travels so he could share them with family. Instead, he was given photos of prisoner abuse. Darby eventually alerted the U.S. military command, triggering an investigation and global outrage when the scandal came to the public's attention in 2004. Graner was sentenced to 10 years in prison for his part in the abuse. He was released in 2011 after serving 6½ years of his sentence. The military and members of Darby's own family ostracized him, calling him a traitor. Eventually he and his wife had to enter protective custody. Here, an Iraqi security officer patrols the prison in 2009.
The New York Times reported in 2005 that in the months after the September 11, 2001, attacks, President George W. Bush authorized the U.S. National Security Agency to eavesdrop without a court warrant on people in the United States, including American citizens, suspected of communicating with al Qaeda members overseas. The Bush administration staunchly defended the controversial surveillance program. Russ Tice, an NSA insider, came forward as one of the anonymous sources used by the Times. He said he was concerned about alleged abuses and a lack of oversight. Here, President Bush participates in a conversation about the Patriot Act in Buffalo, New York, in April 2004.
Army Pfc. Bradley Manning is accused in the largest leak of classified documents in U.S. history. His court-martial began on June 3. He has pleaded guilty to 10 of 22 charges against him and could face up to two decades in jail. He has pleaded not guilty to the most serious charge - that of aiding U.S. enemies, which carries the potential for a life sentence. At a February proceeding, Manning read a statement detailing why and how he sent classified material in 2010 to WikiLeaks, a group that facilitates the anonymous leaking of secret information through its website.
Former intelligence worker Edward Snowden revealed himself as the source of documents outlining a massive effort by the NSA to track cell phone calls and monitor the e-mail and Internet traffic of virtually all Americans. Snowden, 29, fled to Hong Kong after copying the last set of documents. He says he just wanted the public to know what the government was doing. "Even if you're not doing anything wrong you're being watched and recorded," he said. The Justice Department has begun a preliminary investigation into what it called "the unauthorized disclosure of classified information by an individual with authorized access."
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
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Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Paul on Snowden: It's a heroic effort
Assange to Snowden: Go to Latin America
Toobin: Snowden actions illegal, immoral
He said he expects to be prosecuted for the leak. And a federal law enforcement official said Monday that FBI agents have begun an investigation by searching Snowden's home and computers and seeking interviews with his girlfriend, relatives, friends and co-workers.
The leaker's exact whereabouts are unclear at the moment.
Snowden checked out of a Hong Kong hotel where he had been staying on Monday but remains in the semiautonomous Chinese territory, Ewen MacAskill, one of the Guardian journalists who worked with him, said Tuesday.
Surveillance debate
His disclosures have fueled new debate about the U.S. government's collection of records of domestic telephone calls and overseas Internet activity in the global hunt for terrorists and criminals.
Civil liberties advocates say the measures are an unacceptable intrusion into citizens' privacy. But supporters of the programs say they are legal and have yielded evidence that has helped put terror plotters in prison, though many of the details remain classified.
Obama administration officials and leaders of the intelligence committees in Congress say the program undergoes periodic review by all three branches of government, and that the content of Americans' calls is not being monitored.
How does NSA surveillance affect you?
White House spokesman Jay Carney said Monday the measures are a necessary middle way between total privacy and unacceptable threat. He said President Barack Obama would be willing to consider changes should a national debate show the public wants them -- but he wryly noted, "This is not the manner by which he hoped to have the debate."
Snowden's actions have brought together some liberals and conservatives to hail him as a hero.
Liberal activist and filmmaker Michael Moore tweeted that Snowden is "HERO OF THE YEAR." Conservative commentator Glenn Beck, meanwhile, called Snowden a "patriot leaker" who could help America "regain her moral compass."
A petition filed on the White House website Sunday, calling for the Obama administration to issue Snowden a complete pardon, had collected nearly 43,000 signatures by early Tuesday.
Uncertainty over next move
Despite Snowden's insistence that he didn't want the story to become about him, a great deal of attention remains focused on figuring out where he is and what will happen next.
He planned his disclosure and his getaway in great detail, "but this next phase, the phase we're in now, he was almost vague about it," MacAskill said. "I don't think he actually knew or even cared that much. His main objective was to get the information about the level of surveillance out into the public domain and then beyond that, he didn't care."
Legal experts say Hong Kong's extradition treaty with the United States could make it hard for Snowden to successfully fight any proceedings against him unless he is able to prove, for example, that any charges against him are politically motivated.
Although Hong Kong is part of communist-ruled China, the former British colony has a separate system of government that allows a free press and tolerates political dissent.
Patricia Ho, a lawyer with Daly & Associates in Hong Kong whose firm has handled asylum and refugee claims, said that given Hong Kong's lackluster track record on granting asylum, she was surprised Snowden had lauded the territory for its commitment to civil liberties.
"Within China itself, Hong Kong has better civil liberties but I couldn't see the Hong Kong government granting him asylum given their present practices," she said.
Advice from Assange
Snowden has told the Guardian he hopes to seek asylum, potentially in Iceland because of the way it dealt with WikiLeaks, a group that facilitates the anonymous leaking of secret information through its website. The group reportedly once operated from there.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, bottled up in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London since last June, said Snowden should be looking to the southeast, not northwest.
"I would strongly advise him to go to Latin America," Assange told CNN's "Anderson Cooper 360" on Monday night. "Latin America has shown in the past 10 years that it is really pushing forward in human rights. There's a long tradition of asylum."
Assange sought refuge in the Ecuadorian mission to avoid extradition to Sweden, where he is wanted for questioning over allegations that he raped one woman and sexually molested another. He has repeatedly said the allegations in Sweden are politically motivated and tied to the work of his website.
Assange has said he fears Sweden will transfer him to the United States.
Traveling to another country could become difficult for Snowden if U.S. authorities issue an Interpol "red notice" against him, according to Don Borelli, a former FBI agent and U.S. legal attache overseas.
"Many countries recognize an Interpol red notice as kind of a universal arrest warrant," he said.
(CNN) -- As U.S. federal agents build a case against the contractor who exposed controversial electronic surveillance programs by the National Security Agency, one of the journalists who has been working with him says more secrets are set to be revealed soon.
"There are extremely invasive spying programs that the public still does not know about that the NSA regularly engages in or other capabilities that they're developing," said Glenn Greenwald, a columnist for the Guardian, the British newspaper that broke the first story based on secret NSA documents.
"We are working on stories right at this moment that we think are very valuable for the public to know that don't in any way harm national security but that shine a light on this extremely secretive though momentous agency," he said in an interview with CNN's Christiane Amanpour on Monday.
Greenwald received the documents from Edward Snowden, a 29-year-old employee at the computer consultant Booz Allen Hamilton, a contractor for the U.S. electronic intelligence agency.
Snowden told the Guardian that he left behind his family and a six-figure job in Hawaii to reveal the extent of the NSA's collection of telephone and Internet data, which he called "an existential threat to democracy."
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Military analyst Daniel Ellsberg leaked the 7,000-page Pentagon Papers in 1971. The top-secret documents revealed that senior American leaders, including three presidents, knew the Vietnam War was an unwinnable, tragic quagmire. Further, they showed that the government had lied to Congress and the public about the progress of the war. Ellsberg surrendered to authorities and was charged as a spy. The court eventually learned that he was illegally wiretapped by the government and that President Nixon had ordered a break-in at the office of Ellsberg's psychiatrist in attempts to discredit him. All charges against the whistle-blower were dropped. Since then he has lived a relatively quiet life as a respected author and lecturer. The Tuskegee syphilis experiment is often cited as the most famous example of unethical medical research. In 1932, the U.S. Public Health Service began studying untreated syphilis in black men who thought they were getting free health care. None of the patients was told of their affliction, and they weren't sufficiently treated. Peter Buxtun, who worked for the Public Health Service, relayed information about the experiment to a reporter in 1972, which halted the 40-year-long study. His testimony at congressional hearings led to an overhaul of the Health, Education and Welfare rules concerning work with human subjects. A class-action lawsuit was settled out-of-court for $10 million, with the U.S. government promising free medical care to surviving participants and their families. Here, Herman Shaw, one of the test subjects, appears with President Bill Clinton in 1997 during a ceremony apologizing to survivors and families of victims of the study. In 2005, retired deputy FBI director Mark Felt revealed himself to be the whistle-blower "Deep Throat" in the Watergate scandal. He anonymously assisted Washington Post reporters Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward with many of their stories about the Nixon administration's cover-up after the June 1972 break-in at the Democratic National Committee headquarters. The stories sparked a congressional investigation that eventually led to President Nixon's resignation in 1974. The Post won a Pulitzer Prize for its coverage. Felt was convicted on unrelated conspiracy charges in 1980 and eventually pardoned by President Ronald Reagan before slipping into obscurity for the next quarter-century. He died in 2008 at age 95. Mordechai Vanunu, who worked as a technician at Israel's nuclear research facility, leaked information to a British newspaper and led nuclear arms analysts to conclude that Israel possessed a stockpile of nuclear weapons. Israel has neither confirmed nor denied its weapons program. An Israeli court convicted Vanunu in 1986 after Israeli intelligence agents captured him in Italy. He was sentenced to 18 years in prison. Since his release in 2004, he has been arrested on a number of occasions for violating terms of his parole. Mehdi Hashemi, an officer of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, opposed Iranian relations with the United States and acted to undermine an arms for hostages deal between the countries, even though senior Iranian officials supported it and carried it out. A secret and rogue operation carried out by an American military officer used the proceeds from weapons sales to Iran to fund the anti-communist Contras in Nicaragua and attempted to secure the release of U.S. hostages held by Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon. Hashemi leaked evidence of the deal to a Lebanese newspaper in 1986. President Ronald Reagan's closest aides maintain he did not fully know, and only reluctantly came to accept, the circumstances of what came to be known as the Iran-Contra affair. Here, Reagan addresses the media during a press conference at the White House in 1987. Tobacco industry executive Jeffrey Wigand issued a memo to his company in 1992 about his concerns regarding tobacco additives. He was fired in March 1993 and subsequently contacted by "60 Minutes" and persuaded to tell his story on CBS. He claimed that Brown & Williamson knowingly used additives that were carcinogenic and addictive and spent millions covering it up. He also testified in a landmark case in Mississippi that resulted in a $246 billion settlement from the tobacco industry. Wigand has received public recognition for his actions and continues to crusade against Big Tobacco. He was portrayed by Russell Crowe in the 1999 film "The Insider." For 10 years, Frederic Whitehurst complained mostly in vain about practices at the FBI's world-renowned crime lab, where he worked. His efforts eventually led to a 1997 investigation that found lab agents produced inaccurate and scientifically flawed testimony in major cases, including the Oklahoma City and World Trade Center bombings. The Justice Department recommended major reforms but also criticized Whitehurst for "overstated and incendiary" allegations. He also faced disciplinary action for refusing to cooperate with an investigation into how some of his allegations were leaked to a magazine. After a yearlong paid suspension he left the bureau in 1998 with a settlement worth more than $1.16 million. FBI whistle-blower Coleen Rowley accused the bureau of hindering efforts to investigate a suspected terrorist that could have disrupted plans for the September 11, 2001, terror attacks. In 2002 she fired off a 13-page letter to FBI Director Robert Mueller and flew to Washington to hand-deliver copies to two members of the Senate Intelligence Committee and meet with committee staffers. The letter accused the bureau of deliberately undermining requests to look into Zacarias Moussaoui, the only person convicted in the United States of playing a role in the attacks. She testified in front of Congress and the 9/11 Commission about the FBI's mishandling of information. Rowley was selected as one of Time magazine's People of the Year in 2002, along with whistle-blowers Sherron Watkins of Enron and Cynthia Cooper of WorldCom. Sherron Watkins, a former vice president at Enron, sent an anonymous letter to founder Kenneth Lay in 2001 warning him the company had accounting irregularities. The memo eventually reached the public and she later testified before Congress about her concerns and the company's wrongdoings. More than 4,000 Enron employees lost their jobs, and many also lost their life savings, when the energy giant declared bankruptcy in 2001. Investors lost billions of dollars. An investigation in 2002 found that Enron executives reaped millions of dollars from off-the-books partnerships while violating basic rules of accounting and ethics. Many were sentenced to prison for their roles in the Enron scandal. Cynthia Cooper and her team of auditors uncovered massive fraud at WorldCom in 2002. They found that the long-distance telephone provider had used $3.8 billion in questionable accounting entries to inflate earnings over the past five quarters. By the end of 2003, the total fraud was estimated to be $11 billion. The company filed for bankruptcy protection and five executives ended up in prison. Cooper started her own consulting firm and told her story in the book "Extraordinary Circumstances: Journey of a Corporate Whistleblower." WorldCom President and CEO Bernard Ebbers, right, answers questions from the media during a press conference in 1999. In 2003, federal air marshal Robert MacLean anonymously tipped off an MSNBC reporter that because of budget concerns, the TSA was temporarily suspending missions that would require marshals to stay in hotels just days after they were briefed about a new "potential plot" to hijack U.S. airliners. The news caused an immediate uproar on Capitol Hill and the TSA retreated, withdrawing the scheduling cuts before they went into effect. MacLean was later investigated and fired for the unauthorized disclosure of "sensitive security information." Joe Darby is the whistle-blower behind the Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal in Iraq. He says he asked Army Reserve Spc. Charles Graner Jr. for photos from their travels so he could share them with family. Instead, he was given photos of prisoner abuse. Darby eventually alerted the U.S. military command, triggering an investigation and global outrage when the scandal came to the public's attention in 2004. Graner was sentenced to 10 years in prison for his part in the abuse. He was released in 2011 after serving 6½ years of his sentence. The military and members of Darby's own family ostracized him, calling him a traitor. Eventually he and his wife had to enter protective custody. Here, an Iraqi security officer patrols the prison in 2009. The New York Times reported in 2005 that in the months after the September 11, 2001, attacks, President George W. Bush authorized the U.S. National Security Agency to eavesdrop without a court warrant on people in the United States, including American citizens, suspected of communicating with al Qaeda members overseas. The Bush administration staunchly defended the controversial surveillance program. Russ Tice, an NSA insider, came forward as one of the anonymous sources used by the Times. He said he was concerned about alleged abuses and a lack of oversight. Here, President Bush participates in a conversation about the Patriot Act in Buffalo, New York, in April 2004. Army Pfc. Bradley Manning is accused in the largest leak of classified documents in U.S. history. His court-martial began on June 3. He has pleaded guilty to 10 of 22 charges against him and could face up to two decades in jail. He has pleaded not guilty to the most serious charge - that of aiding U.S. enemies, which carries the potential for a life sentence. At a February proceeding, Manning read a statement detailing why and how he sent classified material in 2010 to WikiLeaks, a group that facilitates the anonymous leaking of secret information through its website. Former intelligence worker Edward Snowden revealed himself as the source of documents outlining a massive effort by the NSA to track cell phone calls and monitor the e-mail and Internet traffic of virtually all Americans. Snowden, 29, fled to Hong Kong after copying the last set of documents. He says he just wanted the public to know what the government was doing. "Even if you're not doing anything wrong you're being watched and recorded," he said. The Justice Department has begun a preliminary investigation into what it called "the unauthorized disclosure of classified information by an individual with authorized access." Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
Notable leakers and whistle-blowers
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Notable leakers and whistle-blowers Paul on Snowden: It's a heroic effort Assange to Snowden: Go to Latin America Toobin: Snowden actions illegal, immoral He said he expects to be prosecuted for the leak. And a federal law enforcement official said Monday that FBI agents have begun an investigation by searching Snowden's home and computers and seeking interviews with his girlfriend, relatives, friends and co-workers.
The leaker's exact whereabouts are unclear at the moment.
Snowden checked out of a Hong Kong hotel where he had been staying on Monday but remains in the semiautonomous Chinese territory, Ewen MacAskill, one of the Guardian journalists who worked with him, said Tuesday.
Surveillance debate
His disclosures have fueled new debate about the U.S. government's collection of records of domestic telephone calls and overseas Internet activity in the global hunt for terrorists and criminals.
Civil liberties advocates say the measures are an unacceptable intrusion into citizens' privacy. But supporters of the programs say they are legal and have yielded evidence that has helped put terror plotters in prison, though many of the details remain classified.
Obama administration officials and leaders of the intelligence committees in Congress say the program undergoes periodic review by all three branches of government, and that the content of Americans' calls is not being monitored.
How does NSA surveillance affect you?
White House spokesman Jay Carney said Monday the measures are a necessary middle way between total privacy and unacceptable threat. He said President Barack Obama would be willing to consider changes should a national debate show the public wants them -- but he wryly noted, "This is not the manner by which he hoped to have the debate."
Snowden's actions have brought together some liberals and conservatives to hail him as a hero.
Liberal activist and filmmaker Michael Moore tweeted that Snowden is "HERO OF THE YEAR." Conservative commentator Glenn Beck, meanwhile, called Snowden a "patriot leaker" who could help America "regain her moral compass."
A petition filed on the White House website Sunday, calling for the Obama administration to issue Snowden a complete pardon, had collected nearly 43,000 signatures by early Tuesday.
Uncertainty over next move
Despite Snowden's insistence that he didn't want the story to become about him, a great deal of attention remains focused on figuring out where he is and what will happen next.
He planned his disclosure and his getaway in great detail, "but this next phase, the phase we're in now, he was almost vague about it," MacAskill said. "I don't think he actually knew or even cared that much. His main objective was to get the information about the level of surveillance out into the public domain and then beyond that, he didn't care."
Legal experts say Hong Kong's extradition treaty with the United States could make it hard for Snowden to successfully fight any proceedings against him unless he is able to prove, for example, that any charges against him are politically motivated.
Although Hong Kong is part of communist-ruled China, the former British colony has a separate system of government that allows a free press and tolerates political dissent.
Patricia Ho, a lawyer with Daly & Associates in Hong Kong whose firm has handled asylum and refugee claims, said that given Hong Kong's lackluster track record on granting asylum, she was surprised Snowden had lauded the territory for its commitment to civil liberties.
"Within China itself, Hong Kong has better civil liberties but I couldn't see the Hong Kong government granting him asylum given their present practices," she said.
Advice from Assange
Snowden has told the Guardian he hopes to seek asylum, potentially in Iceland because of the way it dealt with WikiLeaks, a group that facilitates the anonymous leaking of secret information through its website. The group reportedly once operated from there.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, bottled up in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London since last June, said Snowden should be looking to the southeast, not northwest.
"I would strongly advise him to go to Latin America," Assange told CNN's "Anderson Cooper 360" on Monday night. "Latin America has shown in the past 10 years that it is really pushing forward in human rights. There's a long tradition of asylum."
Assange sought refuge in the Ecuadorian mission to avoid extradition to Sweden, where he is wanted for questioning over allegations that he raped one woman and sexually molested another. He has repeatedly said the allegations in Sweden are politically motivated and tied to the work of his website.
Assange has said he fears Sweden will transfer him to the United States.
Traveling to another country could become difficult for Snowden if U.S. authorities issue an Interpol "red notice" against him, according to Don Borelli, a former FBI agent and U.S. legal attache overseas.
"Many countries recognize an Interpol red notice as kind of a universal arrest warrant," he said.
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