My government revoked my passport intentionally to leave me exiled. If they really wanted to capture me, they would've allowed me to travel to Latin America, because the CIA can operate with impunity down there. They did not want that; they chose to keep me in Russia.

I talk to cryptographers, some of the leading technologists in the world, all the time about how we can deal with these issues. It is not possible to create a back door that is only accessible, for example, to the FBI.

Look at the reactions of liberal governments to the surveillance revelations during the last years. In the United States, we've got this big debate, but we've got official paralysis - because they're the ones who had their hand caught most deeply in the cookie jar.

To do that they, the NSA specifically, targets the communications of everyone. It ingests them by default. It collects them in its system and it filters them and it analyses them and it measures them and it stores them for periods of time simply because that's the easiest, most efficient, and most valuable way to achieve these ends. So while they may be intending to target someone associated with a foreign government or someone they suspect of terrorism, they're collecting you're communications to do so.

When I talk about the polling, I'm talking about the principles. It shows these officials are knowingly attempting to shift public opinion, even though they know what they say is not factual.

Because, remember, I didn't want to change society. I wanted to give society a chance to determine if it should change itself.

I was living a charmed life.