In the end, we will never, ever be able to guarantee that there will not be an Edward Snowden or another Chelsea Manning because this is a large enterprise composed of human beings with all their idiosyncrasies.
When I heard Edward Snowden's story, it reminded me of my mother in a strange way. She was in the French resistance from early on, 1941. At that time, the Resistance were considered troublemakers - even traitors - in France.
People are rejecting the power of the elite, but individuals such as Snowden are doing so in a positive way, trying to change things for the better. He is a very intelligent man and obviously interested in electronic music.
Snowden has demonstrated true love for his country. He has done something to improve the lives of people.
I think America is less safe on a lot fronts, and I disagree with the release of the information from Dianne Feinstein. I think she's as much a traitor to this country at this point as I thought about Edward Snowden and his release of information about other investigations and abilities from an intelligence standpoint.
Is Snowden a good man or a bad man? I have no clue and even less interest.
What the Snowden scenario proved is that the weakest link is not the technology, the weakest link is the individual; we shouldn't kid ourselves.
I've never met Snowden, I've never spoken with him personally. I mean, he's extremely smart. Very, very smart. I guess he was a lot less naive than I was.
I mean, Ed Snowden was basically saying the same things that Bill Binney and Thomas Drake and other U.S. whistleblowers had said before him. But he came out more publicly, and maybe revealed more. He showed that when the U.S. government said, 'We are not surveilling U.S. citizens,' that was a lie.
Snowden was extremely good at digital self-defense. When he was employed by the C.I.A. and N.S.A., one of his jobs was to teach U.S. national security officials and C.I.A. employees how to protect their data in high-threat digital environments.
