Someone recently talked about mass surveillance and the NSA revelations as being the atomic moment for computer scientists. The atomic bomb was the moral moment for physicists. Mass surveillance is the same moment for computer scientists, when they realize that the things they produce can be used to harm a tremendous number of people.

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.

In America, we collect more digital communications from America than we do from the Russians.

I'm familiar with Andrei Sakharov reputation, but I don't know his personal history at all.

I was living a charmed life.

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

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.