The Lesser Evil?

By Adrienn Keszei

At first sight, probably most people think of the Snowden/NSA controversy as a case of classic whistleblowing—and these people are not entirely wrong—but after careful consideration of the motives of both parties involved, the picture may not be so black and white anymore.  Edward Snowden has been recognized as a hero by many, and truth be told, his courage to reveal classified NSA information about activities many regard as unconstitutional is indeed impressive considering the consequences he may have to suffer. However, no matter how straightforward this case might seem, it would be unfair and undemocratic to only consider Snowden’s perspective while ignoring the NSA’s explanation.

(Source: http://www.navy.mil/view_image.asp?id=203215 )

Snowden leaked a large amount of information revealing top secret NSA projects that involved mass surveillance (with the cooperation of telecommunications companies), such as systematic data collection from the internet as well as people’s phone calls. This is clearly a violation of Americans’ rights, especially since allegedly the NSA did not only use the metadata, but the content of the phone calls as well. This invasion of privacy is frightening for citizens, who are becoming increasingly outraged as time goes by and more information is revealed about NSA surveillance programs.  At the same time, the NSA is attempting to do damage control, emphasizing, for instance, that the data collection was aimed at foreign targets only. But this begs the question of who is considered as foreign and how accurately can the NSA identify foreignness based on metadata. Can we be sure that only foreign suspects were targeted? Not really. What is also worrying is that once secret intelligence agencies start spying on people, no one knows where they will draw the line. Americans may live in a democracy, but systematic mass surveillance is hauntingly similar to Foucault’s panopticon, where people are objects of information and under constant observation or control. Based on the above, most people would agree that Snowden was absolutely right to leak information about the agency’s operations.

This is the point, however, where we have to consider the NSA’ point of view as well, and explore how the information leak is affecting their work. The NSA claims that Snowden put many people’s lives at stake. By publishing details of top secret operations, Snowden did not only help the American people realize how their privacy was violated, but he also enabled terrorist organizations to acquire information on how the NSA is tracking foreign targets. As these organizations are now abandoning their previous methods to communicate in order to avoid surveillance, field agents are now in much more danger, because intelligence services can no longer protect and/or inform them accurately.

Clearly, Snowden’s decision to publish the NSA files endangered long-term projects to battle terrorism, and it provided useful information for the enemy about the NSA’s surveillance system. Consequently, new programs and strategies will have to be established, which will be costly and time-consuming.  It would be ignorant to forget that the NSA was spying on people with a‘mission’—to eliminate terrorism.  Only a few days passed since the 14^th anniversary of 9/11, and people may wonder how much mass surveillance is actually contributing to the efforts to prevent similar attacks from happening in the future. Is it worth it? Could the illegally obtained information really help the government to stop terrorism? One thing is for sure, it is not so easy to decide what the right thing to do is in such situations.  As in most cases in life, one has to choose the lesser evil, and probably that is what inspired Snowden’s decision.