Snowden, the People’s Hero

Abstract

Whistleblowing is a common thing that has been experienced in countries for a long time, which usually has the aim of reviling dirty secrets of the government and politicians. In 2013 America experienced a shock after a whistleblower exposed a secret program that was conducted by the National security agency (NSA). The program was running surveillance known as PRISM on the citizens without their consent, which forced Edward Snowden an employee of the NSA to expose the program by leaking information about it. This paper will focus on giving a clear overview of Snowden’s actions and revile the people’s opinion on the Snowden revelation.

Snowden, the People’s Hero

Introduction

Edward Snowden worked as an analyst in the National Security Agency, where he discovered the PRISM program that the government conducted in secret. The program was initially designed for tracking any communication in the interwebs that might pose a threat to the country. But on the other hand, the NSA was spying on their citizens acquiring their personal information and data hence invading their privacy. The agency intercepted all types of information that people shared from videos, pictures, voice calls, and SMS (Snowden, 2019). This invasion of privacy by the NSA was what triggered Snowden to expose the program. Being a concerned citizen, Snowden was disturbed by the actions of the NSA, and he decided to shine a light on the illegal spying, which made him a hero for many people while he was labeled an enemy of the state.

Background

Snowden wanted to ensure that he gets the information out to the world using the appropriate means. This led to his collaboration with journalists from the Washington Post and The Guardian, which are America’s most popular media houses. With this collaboration, Snowden was assured of the exposé on PRISM reaching millions of people within a short time. In June 2013, Snowden, after arranging the information he had in an organized format he gave it to the journalists who used it to in writing articles and publishing them on the dailies (Snowden, 2019). The articles did not carry too much weight as the readers could not fathom the information written.

On 9^th June 2013, Snowden agreed to do a video interview with the journalist from the Guardian, which brought closure to the information published on the articles. During this interview is when Snowden revealed his identity to the world as the man behind the leak. He explained his association with NSA, the way PRISM was conducted, and the reason that led to him taking the risky step of whistleblowing against the government (Qin, 2015). Since he was directly connected to the agency, it made him a credible source of information legitimizing the articles written by the journalists on the exposé.

The action of Snowden exposing a top-secret program conducted by the government to run surveillance or spy on the citizens has raised different opinions from all over the world. It resulted in various actions from the government and the public, creating a controversy. To the citizens, Snowden was a real-life Superman, but to the government, he is a criminal who will be charged with espionage once he is arrested (Caster, 2016). he made history as the famous whistleblower in America’s history. The majority of the citizens consider him a hero since he stopped the illegal spying.

Conclusion

although the benefits of Snowden doing the exposé cannot be seen physically. Still, the change it brought is felt. The government made legislation that protects the privacy of personal data, and this happened after the exposé. It also acted as a warning sign to the government for their lack of accountability and transparency with its citizens. To the citizens of America, Snowden will remain a hero to them no matter what the government says about him since he benefited the community in an unthinkable way.

Reference

Caster, Cole. (2016). Edward Snowden, Hero or Traitor? An Analysis of News Media Framing.

Qin, Jie. (2015). Hero on Twitter, Traitor on News: How Social Media and Legacy News Frame Snowden. The International Journal of Press/Politics. 20. 10.1177/1940161214566709

Snowden, E. J. (2019). Permanent record