110+ Edward Snowden Quotes On Privacy, Expose And Reveal

Edward Snowden is an American system administrator, who is famous for leaking classified information from the National Security Agency (NSA) in 2013. He revealed numerous global surveillance programs, many run by the NSA and the Five Eyes Intelligence Alliance with the cooperation of telecommunication companies and European governments. Snowden currently lives in exile in Russia, where he was granted asylum in 2013. Following is our collection on famous quotes by Edward Snowden on privacy, expose, reveal.

Top 10 Edward Snowden Quotes

1. There have been times throughout American history where what is right is not the same as what is legal. Sometimes to do the right thing you have to break the law.
2. Arguing that you don't care about privacy because you have nothing to hide is no different than saying you don't care about free speech because you have nothing to say.
3. Your rights matter, because you never know when you're going to need them.
4. It is afraid of an informed, angry public demanding the constitutional government it was promised - and it should be.
5. I don't want to live in a world where there's no privacy, and therefore no room for intellectual exploration and creativity.
6. We need to think about encryption not as this sort of arcane, black art. It's a basic protection.
7. The sad truth is that societies that demand whistleblowers be martyrs often find themselves without either, and always when it matters the most.
8. Because, remember, I didn't want to change society. I wanted to give society a chance to determine if it should change itself.
9. Bathtub falls and police officers kill more Americans than terrorism, yet we've been asked to sacrifice our most sacred rights for fear of falling victim to it.
10. The NSA has built an infrastructure that allows it to intercept almost everything.

Edward Snowden Short Quotes

• If you’re not acting on your beliefs, then they probably aren’t real.
• Properly implemented strong crypto systems are one of the few things that you can rely on.
• I had been looking for leaders, but I realized that leadership is about being the first to act.
• I’m neither traitor nor hero. I’m an American.
• You can't come up against the world's most powerful intelligence agencies and not accept the risk.
• Radicalism and extremism, while they are dangers, they exist in every society on some level.
• I do not expect to see home again.
• Chelsea Manning got thirty-five years in prison, while I'm still free.
• The rule of law doesn't mean the police are in charge, but that we all answer to the same laws.
• I have no intention of hiding who I am because I know I have done nothing wrong.

Edward Snowden Quotes About Privacy

I can't in good conscience allow the U.S. government to destroy privacy, internet freedom and basic liberties for people around the world with this massive surveillance machine they're secretly building. — Edward Snowden

Everyone everywhere now understands how bad things have gotten — and they’re talking about it. They have the power to decide for themselves whether they are willing to sacrifice their privacy to the surveillance state. — Edward Snowden

We don't have to ask for our privacy, we can take it back. — Edward Snowden

A child born today will grow up with no conception of privacy at all. — Edward Snowden

A child born today will grow up with no conception of privacy at all. They'll never know what it means to have a private moment to themselves an unrecorded, unanalysed thought. And that's a problem because privacy matters, privacy is what allows us to determine who we are and who we want to be. — Edward Snowden

I would argue that security and liberty, security and privacy are not actually opposing. The only place those can be oppositional is in the realm of rhetoric but not fact. — Edward Snowden

Privacy is a function of liberty. — Edward Snowden

Privacy matters; privacy is what allows us to determine who we are and who we want to be. — Edward Snowden

Edward Snowden Quotes About Reveal

Allowing the U.S. government to intimidate its people with threats of retaliation for revealing wrongdoing is contrary to the public interest. — Edward Snowden

I will be satisfied if the federation of secret law, unequal pardon and irresistible executive powers that rule the world that I love are revealed even for an instant. — Edward Snowden

The surveillance revelations are critically important because they revealed that our rights are being redefined in secret, by secret courts that were never intended to have that role - without the consent of the public, without even the awareness of the majority of our political representatives. — Edward Snowden

Edward Snowden Famous Quotes And Sayings

Being a patriot doesn’t mean prioritizing service to government above all else. Being a patriot means knowing when to protect your country, knowing when to protect your Constitution, knowing when to protect your countrymen, from the violations of and encroachments of adversaries. And those adversaries don’t have to be foreign countries. — Edward Snowden

Any analyst at any time can target anyone. Any selector, anywhere I, sitting at my desk, certainly had the authorities to wiretap anyone, from you or your accountant, to a federal judge, to even the President — Edward Snowden

There can be no faith in government if our highest offices are excused from scrutiny - they should be setting the example of transparency. — Edward Snowden

The internet is the most complex system that humans have ever invented. And with every internet enabled operation that we've seen so far, all of these offensive operations, we see knock on effects. We see unintended consequences. — Edward Snowden

America is a fundamentally good country. We have good people with good values who want to do the right thing. But the structures of power that exist are working to their own ends to extend their capability at the expense of the freedom of all publics. — Edward Snowden

When you say, ‘I have nothing to hide,’ you’re saying, ‘I don’t care about this right.’ You’re saying, ‘I don’t have this right, because I’ve got to the point where I have to justify it.’ The way rights work is, the government has to justify its intrusion into your rights. — Edward Snowden

In the end, the Obama administration is not afraid of whistleblowers like me, Bradley Manning or Thomas Drake. We are stateless, imprisoned or powerless. No, the Obama administration is afraid of you. It is afraid of an informed, angry public demanding the constitutional government it was promised - and it should be. — Edward Snowden

Anyway, it's not true that the authorities cannot access the content of the phone even if there is no back door. When I was at the NSA, we did this every single day, even on Sundays. I believe that encryption is a civic responsibility, a civic duty. — Edward Snowden

The people at the NSA aren't trying to ruin your life. They're not trying to put you in authoritarian dystopia. These are normal people trying to do good work in hard circumstances. — Edward Snowden

The way the United States intelligence community operates is it doesn't limit itself to the protection of the homeland. It doesn't limit itself to countering terrorist threats, countering nuclear proliferation. It's also used for economic espionage, for political spying to gain some knowledge of what other countries are doing. — Edward Snowden

As for labeling someone a whistleblower, I think it does them - it does all of us - a disservice, because it "otherizes" us. — Edward Snowden

Encryption works. Properly implemented strong crypto systems are one of the few things that you can rely on. Unfortunately, endpoint security is so terrifically weak that NSA can frequently find ways around it. — Edward Snowden

When you're attacking a router on the internet, and you're doing it remotely, it's like trying to shoot the moon with a rifle. Everything has to happen exactly right. Every single variable has to be controlled and precisely accounted for. And that's not possible to do when you have limited knowledge of the target you're attacking. — Edward Snowden

My sole motive is to inform the public as to that which is done in their name and that which is done against them. — Edward Snowden

I believe that at this point in history, the greatest danger to our freedom and way of life comes from the reasonable fear of omniscient State powers kept in check by nothing more than policy documents. — Edward Snowden

For me, in terms of personal satisfaction, the mission's already accomplished. I already won. As soon as the journalists were able to work, everything that I had been trying to do was validated. Because, remember, I didn't want to change society. I wanted to give society a chance to determine if it should change itself. — Edward Snowden

I'm saying we need to be aware of it, and we need to be able to distinguish when political developments are occurring that are contrary to the public interest. — Edward Snowden

There's not much value to us attacking Chinese systems. We might take a few computers offline. We might take a factory offline. We might steal secrets from a university research programs, and even something high-tech. But how much more does the United States spend on research and development than China does? — Edward Snowden

Initially I was very encouraged. Unfortunately, the mainstream media now seems far more interested in what I said when I was 17 or what my girlfriend looks like rather than, say, the largest program of suspicionless surveillance in human history. — Edward Snowden

Before 2013, if you said the NSA was making records of everybody's phone calls and the [Government Communications Headquarters] was monitoring lawyers and journalists, people raised eyebrows and called you a conspiracy theorist. Those days are over. — Edward Snowden

If I am traitor, who did I betray? I gave all my information to the American public, to American journalists who are reporting on American issues. If they see that as treason, I think people really need to consider who they think they're working for. The public is supposed to be their boss, not their enemy. — Edward Snowden

There were no whistleblower protections that would've protected me - and that's known to everybody in the intelligence community. There are no proper channels for making this information available when the system fails comprehensively. — Edward Snowden

The true measurement of a person's worth isn't what they say they believe in, but what they do in defense of those beliefs. If you're not acting on your beliefs, then they probably aren't real. — Edward Snowden

If we don't do anything, if we go along with the status quo, we are going to have a mass surveillance world. — Edward Snowden

These [NSA] programs were never about terrorism: they're about economic spying, social control, and diplomatic manipulation. They're about power. — Edward Snowden

Richard Nixon got kicked out of Washington for tapping one hotel suite. Today we're tapping every American citizen in the country, and no one has been put on trial for it or even investigated. We don't even have an inquiry into it. — Edward Snowden

There was a real choice when [Barack Obama] became president. It was a very difficult choice - to say, "We're not going to hold senior officials to account with the same laws that every other citizen in the country is held to," or "This is a nation that believes in the rule of law." — Edward Snowden

There are proxies, proxy servers on the internet, and this is very typical for hackers to use. They create what are called proxy chains where they gain access to a number of different systems around the world, sometimes by hacking these, and they use them as sort of relay boxes. — Edward Snowden

I know the media likes to personalize political debates, and I know the government will demonize me. — Edward Snowden

All the governments just want to have more power when it comes to economic espionage, diplomatic manipulation and political influence. — Edward Snowden

When we look at how, constitutionally, only Congress can declare war, and that is routinely ignored. Not NATO or the UN, but Congress has to authorize these endless wars, and it isn't. — Edward Snowden

I don't want the stage. I'm terrified of giving these talking heads some distraction, some excuse to jeopardize, smear, and delegitimize a very important movement. — Edward Snowden

Cyber Command is supposed to be defending our critical infrastructure at home, but they are spending so much time looking at how to attack networks, how to break systems, and how to turn things off. I don't think it adds up as representing a defensive team. — Edward Snowden

Getting inequality out there into the consciousness was important. All these political pundits now talking about the 2014 and 2016 elections are talking about inequality. — Edward Snowden

The government has granted itself power it is not entitled to. There is no public oversight. The result is people like myself have the latitude to go further than they are allowed to. — Edward Snowden

We have got a CIA station just up the road – the consulate here in Hong Kong – and I am sure they are going to be busy for the next week. And that is a concern I will live with for the rest of my life, however long that happens to be. — Edward Snowden

The public needs to know the kinds of things a government does in its name, or the 'consent of the governed' is meaningless... The consent of the governed is not consent if it is not informed. — Edward Snowden

I believe that when [senator Ron] Wyden and [senator Mark] Udall asked about the scale of this, they [the NSA] said it did not have the tools to provide an answer. We do have the tools and I have maps showing where people have been scrutinised most. We collect more digital communications from America than we do from the Russians. — Edward Snowden

The majority of people in developed countries spend at least some time interacting with the Internet, and Governments are abusing that necessity in secret to extend their powers beyond what is necessary and appropriate. — Edward Snowden

People have to be free to investigate computer security. People have to be free to look for the vulnerabilities and create proof of concept code to show that they are true vulnerabilities in order for us to secure our systems. — Edward Snowden

I do not want to live in a world where everything I do and say is recorded. That is not something I am willing to support or live under. — Edward Snowden

The only thing I fear is the harmful effects on my family, who I won't be able to help any more. That's what keeps me up at night. — Edward Snowden

You can show a guy sort of peeking over the wall, you can see a guy tunneling underneath, you can see a guy going through the front door. All of those, in cyber terms, are vulnerabilities, because it's not that you have to look for one hole of a specific type. It's the whole paradigm. — Edward Snowden

I don't care if I end up in jail or Guantánamo or whatever, kicked out of a plane with two gunshots in the face. I did what I did because I believe it is the right thing to do, and I will continue to do that. — Edward Snowden

One of the kind of unexpectedly liberating things of becoming this global fugitive is the fact that you don't worry so much about tomorrow. You think more about today. And unexpectedly, I like that very much. — Edward Snowden

The United States has faced threats from criminal groups, from terrorists, from spies throughout our history, and we have limited our responses. We haven't resorted to total war every time we have a conflict around the world, because that restraint is what defines us. That restraint is what gives us the moral standing to lead the world. — Edward Snowden

If I wanted to see your emails or your wife's phone, all I have to do is use intercepts. I can get your emails, passwords, phone records, credit cards. — Edward Snowden

It is interesting that so many people who become disenchanted, who protest against their own organizations, are people who contributed something to them and then saw how it was misused. — Edward Snowden

We have to be able to reject disproportionate and unjustified responses in the cyber domain just as we do in the physical domain. — Edward Snowden

There are more important things than money. If I were motivated by money, I could have sold these documents to any number of countries and gotten very rich. — Edward Snowden

A lot of people in 2008 voted for Obama. I did not vote for him. I voted for a third party. But I believed in Obama's promises. — Edward Snowden

They are intent on making every conversation and every form of behaviour in the world known to them. — Edward Snowden

I was hoping to catch [Vladimir] Putin in a lie - like what happened to Director of National Intelligence James Clapper [in his congressional testimony]. So I asked Putin basically the same questions about Russian mass surveillance. I knew he's doing the same thing, but he denied it. — Edward Snowden

Even if you're not doing anything wrong, you are being watched and recorded. — Edward Snowden

The greatest fear that I have regarding the outcome for America of these disclosures is that nothing will change. — Edward Snowden

The public don't want to authorize the internet to become a battleground. We need to do everything we can as a society to keep that a neutral zone, to keep that an economic zone that can reflect our values, both politically, socially, and economically. — Edward Snowden

The NSA has built an infrastructure that allows it to intercept almost everything. With this capability, the vast majority of human communications are automatically ingested without targeting. If I wanted to see your emails or your wife's phone, all I have to do is use intercepts. I can get your emails, passwords, phone records, credit cards. — Edward Snowden

The Iraq war that I signed up for was launched on false premises. The American people were misled. Now, whether that was due to bad faith or simply mistakes in intelligence, I can't say for sure. But I can say it shows the problem of putting too much faith in intelligence systems without debating them in public. — Edward Snowden

I understand that I will be made to suffer for my actions, and that the return of this information to the public marks my end. — Edward Snowden

Society really seems to have developed an unquestioning obedience towards spooky types… Did we get to where we are today via a slippery slope that was entirely within our control to stop? Or was it a relatively instantaneous sea change that sneaked in undetected because of pervasive government secrecy? — Edward Snowden

We need the security standards to apply to the internet. We need to be able to trust that when we send our emails through Verizon, that Verizon isn't sharing with the NSA, that Verizon isn't sharing them with the FBI or German intelligence or French intelligence or Russian intelligence or Chinese intelligence. — Edward Snowden

We do not live in a revolutionary time. People are not prepared to contest power. — Edward Snowden

We need to put the security back in the National Security Agency. We can't have the national surveillance agency. — Edward Snowden

There are programs such as the NSA paying RSA $10 million to use an insecure encryption standard by default in their products. That's making us more vulnerable not just to the snooping of our domestic agencies, but also foreign agencies. — Edward Snowden

The United States is more reliant on the technical systems. We're more reliant on the critical infrastructure of the internet than any other nation out there. And when there's such a low barrier to entering the domain of cyber-attacks we're starting a fight that we can't win. — Edward Snowden

One of the saddest and most damaging legacies of the [George W.] Bush administration is the increased assertion of the "state secrets" privilege, which kept organizations like the ACLU - which had cases of people who had actually been tortured and held in indefinite detention - from getting their day in court. — Edward Snowden

You would be surprised how effective, at least for influencing low-information voters, negative propaganda about me is. — Edward Snowden

If I target for example an email address, for example under FAA 702, and that email address sent something to you, Joe America, the analyst gets it. All of it. IPs, raw data, content, headers, attachments, everything. And it gets saved for a very long time - and can be extended further with waivers rather than warrants. — Edward Snowden

[I watch] all that stuff - Game of Thrones and all the other series. How about House of Cards? As for Boardwalk Empire - that's another period of government overreach, but at least they use the amendment process! In real life, the executive branch, by violating the Constitution, is using statutes in place of constitutional amendments to diminish our liberty. — Edward Snowden

I went to a website the other day and right at the top of the page it showed me my ip address. It was the most disturbing moment I have ever experienced. This website even told me what internet browser I was using, and what day it was. Computers can do anything. — Edward Snowden

They still have negligent auditing, they still have things going for a walk, and they have no idea where they're coming from and they have no idea where they're going. And if that's the case, how can we as the public trust the NSA with all of our information, with all of our private records, the permanent record of our lives? — Edward Snowden

While the US Constitution marks these programs as illegal, my government argues that secret court rulings, which the world is not permitted to see, somehow legitimize an illegal affair. These rulings simply corrupt the most basic notion of justice - that it must be seen to be done. The immoral cannot be made moral through the use of secret law. — Edward Snowden

From the very beginning, I said there are two tracks of reform: there's the political and the technical. I don't believe the political will be successful, for exactly the reasons you underlined. The issue is too abstract for average people, who have too many things going on in their lives. — Edward Snowden

When the police officers knock on your door with a warrant, they don't expect you to give them a tour. It's supposed to be an adversarial process so that it's used in these extraordinary powers are applied only when there's no alternative. Only when they're absolutely necessary, and only when they're proportionate to the threat faced by these individuals. — Edward Snowden

Let's put it this way. The United States government has assembled a massive investigation team into me personally, into my work with the journalists, and they still have no idea what documents were provided to the journalist, what they have, what they don't have, because encryption works. — Edward Snowden

A zero-day exploit is a method of hacking a system. It's sort of a vulnerability that has an exploit written for it, sort of a key and a lock that go together to a given software package. It could be an internet web server. It could be Microsoft Office. It could be Adobe Reader or it could be Facebook. — Edward Snowden

All I wanted was for the public to be able to have a say in how they are governed. That is a milestone we left a long time ago. — Edward Snowden

You have to remember the way the internet works, when you communicate with the server, it's very likely not in your country. It's somewhere else in the world. — Edward Snowden

I hope you have read the election programme of the Labour Party...this is not socialism. It is Bolshevism run mad. — Edward Snowden

I've been a spy for almost all of my adult life - I don't like being in the spotlight. — Edward Snowden

There are cyber threats out there, this is a dangerous world, and we have to be safe, we have to be secure no matter the cost. — Edward Snowden

We have to call mass surveillance mass surveillance. We can't let governments around the world redefine, and sort of weasel their way out of it by saying this is bulk collection. — Edward Snowden

We decentralise the ability to decide the level of publicity that's attached to any of our communications. — Edward Snowden

We are no longer citizens, we no longer have leaders. We're subjects, and we have rulers. — Edward Snowden

I was living a charmed life. — Edward Snowden

I don't want to live in a world where everything that I say, everything I do, everyone I talk to, every expression of creativity or love or friendship is recorded. — Edward Snowden

Life Lessons by Edward Snowden

1. Edward Snowden's work serves as a reminder that individuals have the power to stand up to government overreach and challenge the status quo.
2. His actions demonstrate that whistleblowing can be an effective way to hold governments and corporations accountable for their actions.
3. Snowden's example shows that people should be aware of their civil liberties and be willing to fight for them when necessary.