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.

I know that fundamentally, changes to the fabric of the internet, and sort of our methods of communication, can enforce our rights.

Citizens with a conscience are not going to ignore wrong-doing simply because they'll be destroyed for it: the conscience forbids it.

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.

[Bill] Binney designed ThinThread, an NSA program that used encryption to try to make mass surveillance less objectionable. It would still have been unlawful and unconstitutional.

Nobody's going to vote for terrorism. So our governments don't have that sort of political pressure to act in a responsible manner when it comes to stewardship of our rights.

You are also asked to take an oath, and that's the oath of service. The oath of service is not to secrecy, but to the Constitution - to protect it against all enemies, foreign and domestic. That's the oath that I kept, that James Clapper and former NSA director Keith Alexander did not. You raise your hand and you take the oath in your class when you are on board. All government officials are made to do it who work for the intelligence agencies - at least, that's where I took the oath.