People in both parties from the congressional intelligence committees - all these co-opted officials who play cheerleader for spy agencies - go on these Sunday shows and they say: "Snowden was a traitor. He works against Americans. He works for the Chinese. Oh, wait, he left Hong Kong - he works for the Russians."

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.

We reject techniques like torture regardless of whether they're effective or ineffective because they are barbaric and harmful on a broad scale. It's the same thing with cyber warfare. We should never be attacking hospitals. We should never be taking down power plants unless that is absolutely necessary to ensure our continued existence as a free people.

Defending ourselves from internet-based attacks, internet-originated attacks, is much, much more important than our ability to launch attacks against similar targets in foreign countries.

Going all the way back to Daniel Ellsberg, it is clear that the government is not concerned with damage to national security, because in none of these cases was there damage.

The only reason I do these interviews - I hate talking about myself, I hate doing this stuff - is because incredibly well-meaning people, whom I respect and trust, tell me that this will help bring about positive changes. It's not going to cause a sea change, but it will benefit the public.

Much of what I saw in Geneva really disillusioned me about how my government functions and what its impact is in the world. I realised that I was part of something that was doing far more harm than good.