Edward Snowden is Almost Broke | Hacker News Reader

Edward Snowden is Almost Broke

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286 points_hv99195 comments

I'm actually surprised he has any access to his money at all. I assumed all of his assets would have been frozen under some sort of murky fugitive/terrorist/organized crime laws.

Or maybe he took proactive steps to keep this from happening?

Well he could have withdrawn some significant amount of cash before leaving, or put it in banks not controlled by US interests.

> or put it in banks not controlled by US interests.

That would probably be tough for him to have done.

Why is that? After all, he knew that he was blowing out some serious secrets, and he did take the necessary steps to protect himself from direct retaliation at the time, and was advised on how to do so as well. It would not make much sense that he would have somehow "forgot" about protecting his financial assets.

The US has even bent the Swiss banks to their will. I think that "not under US influence" isn't a synonym for "outside of the US."

Withdrawing large amounts of cash, or transferring money to (e.g.) the Bank Melli Iran would have presumably raised red flags.

depending on the amount HSBC/Citibank can be considered not under US influence.

Everything that uses the SWIFT banking system is under the US control. So that's basically everything and everybody. That's wht some of the BRIC's are setting up their own SWIFT payment system...

I think you are overstating the amount of control the US has. The US is spying on SWIFT transactions, that's a world of a difference from actually controlling SWIFT.

Did I really?

WallStreetJournal :"Both houses of the U.S. Congress have drafted legislation threatening to penalize Swift's board and owners if they didn't ban the suspect Iranian entities from using its network."

http://online.wsj.com/news/articles/SB1000142405297020479530...

Again, this quote says nothing of the US having control over the Swift network itself.

Denial works as well as control. Deny access through,to, or from, it pretty much sufficient.

As the quote from Dune goes, He who can destroy a thing, controls a thing.

I think he was referring to this:

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-07-02/hsbc-judge-approves...

http://nypost.com/2012/04/05/us-regulator-cites-citibank-for...

I don't think it's unreasonable to assume that the financial dealings of Top Secret personnel is under some level of surveillance.

It's not about where to move it to, but moving it in the first place.

OTOH, it would not be hard to play the "paycheck-to-paycheck game" and withdraw all his cash, spend very little of it, and launder it through his trusted friends who could very well have imported it to Hong Kong (at $9,999 per flight) before he flew the coop.

I'd say that's exactly the kind of behaviour that gets flagged. Why did you shift from spending on your credit card and saving in your account to taking out almost all your money in cash every month? The guy made $100k+, that's a lot of money. Drug problem, trying to pay a blackmailer off?

Also, I wouldn't overestimate how many of his friends he could successfully enlist in what technically (if not morally) was a conspiracy to commit treason.

For something like this to be successful, it needs to come out of the blue.

Reading through this comment chain and seeing all the plausible speculations about how these guys' banking info are monitored for red flags..

a) Why are we not mad about that kinda thing? b) Doesn't the law of large numbers say that even if someone does something that looks weird, it might just be for random fluctuations? Or is the financial system too.. regular?

I think you're overestimating the capacity of the security apparatus to monitor the security apparatus.

They have so much work that they have to hire contractors to do it. They rely on the clearance process to weed out the untrustworthy. Re-investigations are typically at 5 year intervals.

It would not surprise me that any person they have watching the store is someone who is being chided for not doing "real" work.

Basically "Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?" Nobody, apparently.

So the same NSA that we believe to monitor all private, public and encrypted communications on the internet, and expect to render the privacy features Tor ineffective, does not have the competence to keep an eye on its own employees?

Snowden is proof of that.

Snowden is proof of part of that. The part that monitored him having access to and making copies of TS data failed. It doesn't mean any other part of the apparatus is incompetent.

Put another way, I have a friend who couldn't run a mile in less than an hour. He could easily put a bullet into an apple on your head at a couple hundred yards however. If we were to consider him an adversary, dismissing him because he cant run worth a damn would be unwise.

It's a different competency.

The NSA tries to monitor all communication. If it fails to monitor 10% of the communication, or 5%, or 1%, it is still problematic that it monitors the other 90-99%.

If it retains control of the information it has captured at a 90-99% efficacy rate, on the other hand, that still basically means that it leaks information like a sieve.

If they were that good, Snowden would have never exfiltrated all that data in the first place.

Judging from this report, they seem to have a misplaced faith in the ability of the almighty polygraph to root out insiders.

I quote: If you've been cleared and especially if you've been polygraphed, you're an insider and you are presumed to be trustworthy

<http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSBRE9A703020131108?irpc...

In any case, if you're financially well-disciplined (that's a very big if), it's easy to hide money somewhere and pretend you're blowing it on useless junk.

There's actually a lot of people with TS clearances. When I was in the military, I and everybody I worked with had one. Just as how more information gets classified than is really necessary due to CYA, more personnel than strictly necessary gets processed for TS clearances simply due to the ubiquity of TS-classified information. You're talking tens of thousands of personnel. I doubt you could monitor them all any more closely than the rest of them.

There's a difference between eligibility for a clearance (which is the screening process you refer to) and actually having a clearance. You have a clearance when you're at a job where one is required. When you depart that job your clearance is revoked (but the eligibility screening remains). So you don't need to monitor everyone with a screening, just those with an actual in-use clearance.

True, but that is still tens of thousands of people.

I just went on Wikipedia to check my rough estimates. I was off by a few orders of magnitude. A WaPo article in 2010 claims 854,000 people had an active clearance. That's a lot of potential leakers.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/08...

Indeed. As Iran has found out, essentially the entire global financial system (via SWIFT, etc) will be closed off to you if the US is after you.

Another example: Wikileaks.

If you blow the whistle on something then all of your resources are put into getting to the whistleblowing stage. The dedication is entirely devoted to the act, not the aftermath. All that is expected of the aftermath is a bumpy ride, the possibility of being universally despised, ostracised from society and so on. Money and the means to get by is not perceived to be such a big problem when one is fully prepared to end up in Guantanamo Bay. To some extent that is the end goal, in that respect Chelsea Manning succeeded. Snowden did pretty well getting to Russia, getting some hangers on to provide support and getting a job. The fact that he is broke is mere mortal stuff, he is waiting for his pay check to come through.

As any ex-cat-1 prisoner can tell you, life on the run is the most expensive way to live. With Snowden he has had many agencies after him, all with their different approaches. Obviously the U.S. have been on his case, they tend to be good at the sigint stuff but not so good at actual spy trade craft. I would not be at all surprised if there was a British team on his case too, better able to watch him pop to the shops for a pint of milk. Then the Russians will be monitoring everything, on their home turf and able to keep watch on who is keeping watch. Not all watchers will be hostile to him, after all we are all human (Tony Blair excepted), however, none of the many folks observing him will be able to assist him. They will watch him starve rather than intervene.

Presumably he is not as on-the-run as he has had to be, however, the practical implications of being completely on-the-run are more than you might think. Imagine he wants to be able to do things like sleep without being observed. That means he has to move every day, and at extremely short notice so anyone watching him does not get a head start, e.g. to bug a hotel room before he gets in there. He also has to pay cash up front just on the off chance he has lost his tail. Then the same again the next day and the day after that.

Eventually he will realise that trying to escape his watchers is a fruitless task and decide it is better to take a disinformation approach. At this stage he could try to convince those behind the bugs that he has gone mad. Claiming to be the messiah, pretending to have narrowly avoided being poisoned, hearing voices - standard lunatic stuff. He might also want to go the extra mile on proving that he is no longer an existential threat to the American Way of Life, taking up a pastime such as computer gaming, putting in marathon Playstation sessions and completely ignoring the news. After a year or so of doing this he will be able to convince himself that he has his privacy back and live the normal life.

Snowden probably also has had the problem of living off a good pay cheque and then having to adapt to a normal pay check, or no money at all. If you are used to paying thousands a month on accommodation, buying nice food and doing things like driving a car then it can take a while to adapt to barely having enough money to afford groceries for the next day. A mental attitude has to change, from being generous with tips to actually living off what that tip would be. That change does not happen so easily, even if circumstance forces that change to be necessary.

Anyway...

This talk of sending the guy a few bitcoins is far off from the reality of his situation. Sounds to me that he actually does have everything that he needs to live, i.e. a job and a few close friends. He has sorted himself out. He does not need to be beholden to charity handouts.

"...pretending to have narrowly avoided being poisoned, hearing voices - standard lunatic stuff."

Not so sure fear of poisoning would be evidence of mental illness in this case, depending on the nature of the poison.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polonium#Well-known_poisoning_c...

Hey,

Your description of a life on the run was quite interesting and I was wondering if I could ask a few questions - would it be possible to do that? (your profile does not have an email ID)

Sure, what's wrong with keeping the conversation here?

I have no special insight gained from first hand experience, however, if I meet someone that has a criminal record I make friends rather than run away from them. There can be many benefits in doing this, e.g. you have someone that appreciates and respects your advice, they can possibly do a better job than the police in retrieving your belongings if they get stolen, you can obtain unobtainable 'black market' items, get to the best parties, find out information not in the public domain and so on. You also get the best stories. I merely presented a composite, abbreviated version of things I have learned along the way. I am sure the same stuff could be found in films and books. I am also sure that the spies know what cycle to expect from those they take care of.

Your profile has no email ID either - was going to write!

Anyway, couple of other things for you, since you are interested in the topic...

In the movies the guy on the run is able to get some help and support, in real life moral courage coupled with cognitive dissonance, hostile propaganda and ineptness gets in the way of that. Hence Mr Snowden, for all his many supporters is probably alone in very subtle ways, even when amongst trusted friends. None of those around him have pushed back the fear boundaries or played a tight game in a sigint-hostile 'battlespace', therefore, even if their intentions are good, or they think they have good intentions, things like basic stupidity get in the way. (Note that stupidity is the most harmful thing in the known universe.) Furthermore, anything involving actual risk is not something an honourable sort like Mr Snowden can palm off on others, so he is very much stuck doing everything himself, with no meaningful organisation to help him.

This situation was also a serious problem for Martin Luther King. He was able to get millions to turn up in support of what he had to do, yet he was also deeply alone. Part of his popularity stems from this, people who were alone could relate to what he said.

Orwell's classic 1984 is also quite interesting. We all read it at school, however, I believe the book takes on a whole new level of insight to those that are blowing the whistle in a surveillance society. Details like Winston's health problems take on a peculiar relevance. However, Orwell did not go far enough on the subtleties of betrayal and stupidity.

He wasn't making that much money, and some of it had to be in hard to reach places. (401Ks?) So even if he had 100K, how long will it last when you're travelling internationally and staying in expensive hotels?

Being a whistleblower doesn't excuse you from having to work for a living. I hope he's able to get decent employment.

And cashing out your 401k while holding a Top Secret clearance sounds like a major red flag. If he did cash it out, I wonder if he stuck around to pay the tax penalties for doing so?

401k administrators are required to discount any 401k payout by an estimate of the amount of tax you would owe including the 10% penalty. So if you cashed out $100,000 you'd likely only received a check for about $60,000. The rest would go directly to the IRS and if that made you pay too much you could get your refund the following year.

The IRS always get paid.

he could also take a loan from his 401k

They don't allow you to loan out >50% of your 401k.

I'll reach out in the morning to people/orgs in touch with him and see if taskforce.is can set up some way of getting money to him without a big legal risk.

Good idea! Keep us informed if it worked, I would be very happy to donate!

He could get Bitcoin address and ask for donations. I would be surprised if he didn't think about this already. He might not want to give the Government a excuse to ban Bitcoin.

I am not sure how easy it is to get money in/out to/of bitcoin from within Russia, at least in New Zealand it is generally a PITA and involves many hoops.

At least one major exchange (btc-e) allows deposits/withdrawals in rubles.

Roubles? Wouldn't dollars be better?

In Russia dollars are not quite useful.

I'd think you can exchange dollars everywhere in the world, even in Russia.

That doesn't mean it wouldn't be a pain in the butt, as well as much easier to track.

Yes but getting Bitcoin exchange that you can withdraw money from in foreign currency is trickier.

When I was in St Peterburg a few years ago, dollars were welcome. Some said, they even prefer them to rubles.

the USD was so much more preferred for such a long time, especially as the ruble was losing 10% of its value each month at one point, that the Russians have made settling cash transactions in non-ruble's illegal.

They also introduced a plethora of cash import and export laws, since at one point 90%+ of all transactions and 60%+ of GDP was black/grey market cash and in USD. Russia is still a cash heavy economy, now its just ruble's instead of dollars.

It means you find it hard to buy or sell rubles outside of Russia, and inside exchanging USD is expensive since the purchaser (edit: exchange businesses) needs to have a license for exchange and a license to hold USD.

off course people still use the dollar, but its no longer a case that you have a black market cash exchanger standing on every street corner, or every restaurant and bar etc. accepting USD. It is why more recently some politicians have called on a complete ban on foreign currencies, and a ban on any cash payments for goods over a certain value.

The difference between now and 10 years ago for foreigners is that credit cards are more broadly accepted and easy to use, as are ATM's for foreign cards. I wouldn't even bother going through the hoops of dealing with cash or exchanging cash were I visiting.

"since the purchaser needs to have a license for exchange and a license to hold USD"

What do you mean? Residents don't need anything to buy or hold USD, not sure about businesses.

I'm guessing he means the exchange offices have to have a license for doing the exchange business. Not residents or businesses.

They are as useful as any other currency. Converting between currencies ceased to be an issue in Russia about 20 years ago.

He lives in Russia.

In Russia it's quite opposite: btc-e.com provides a number of convenient ways to withdraw fiat money.

Why not use Western Union?

You can send Bitcoins to this address if you want to support him: https://blockchain.info/address/1snowqQP5VmZgU47i5AWwz9fsgHQ...

Source: https://wikileaks.org/freesnowden

He already received 141 Bitcoins (over 50'000 USD) on that address.

Did they get to him?

This is specifically "for the legal defence campaign of Mr Edward Snowden". The page doesn't mention any of it going to support Snowden himself.

And that might be an important distinction -- IANAL, but contributing to someone's defense fund seems like a perfectly legal thing to do; financially supporting someone on the run from the US government, I'm not sure quite how legal that is. I'm curious if anyone knows more.

And these coins remain untouched which does not look broke at first sight at all. But as others stated out, this is legal defense and for a living he should not use a traceable address like that but rather one time addresses.

Yeah, I would also be interested where I could chip some coins for his every day expenses.

What would be the legality of sending Snowden money? He's been charged with a crime and donations would enable him to live outside the country. Isn't that aiding and abetting a fugitive?

The bare truth is "almost certainly."

Would that be relevant to people outside the US, though? I guess they cannot legally go around, charging people with aiding a fugitive, all over the world. (Or maybe that's just overly naïve on my part)

It basically depends on the country and your personal situation. If you're the kind of person the US gov't would be interested in going after, then you probably shouldn't donate, as it's an extra and arguably unnecessary vulnerability to an offense pinnable to you.

It's a risk assessment. If you're not sure, then I'd say it's unlikely you need to worry. For me personally, for instance, even if a donation would put me on some watch list, it actually wouldn't change anything in my life or my anticipated plans.

They can charge you, but they probably can't (practically) come and get you. Whether they would bother is another question entirely (ans: probably not, unless you brought it to their attention via some other mechanism).

I do not think the US government would bother to try to prosecute that. It is just not worth the resulting diplomatic drama.

I think right now the Obama administration is happy that people are starting to forget about the whole affair. The NSA's mass surveillance program is still on and it seems now accepted as the new normal.

Ultimately Snowden has failed. He exposed the program but the resulting outrage was not strong enough to bring it down. In fact, now that the US government got away with this they will probably get even more extreme in future..

And what about his lawyers, or his parents, or anyone else that gives him any sort of support?

We should help him. How we the HN community could? I'd love to hear ideas from all of you.

I hope he doesn't start burning classified documents for warmth...

As gasull above mentioned, if he supplied a bitcoin address, we could send him some?

Yeah, that'd be awesome. He could PGP sign it so we know it's him.

He'd have to publish a public key first through some kind of a trusted entity.

While I don't have any ideas, I can at least add my voice to those saying "I will send money to this man if there is a way to do so". I'm dubious of that Journalistic Source Protection Defence Fundraiser that's been posted as it sounds like he needs more than just lawyer money right now.

And I think there are a lot of us out there who will contribute financially as soon as there's a bonafide way of doing so.

We at https://taskforce.is (mostly HNers) can help set something up,. I'll reach out to ACLU and his lawyers in the morning.

Taskforce looks seriously cool. It deserves more attention on Hacker News and elsewhere.

Does Taskforce have badges or support banners for webmasters and bloggers to put on their sites and link to you?

What I want to know, is Snowden going to do his tax return this year in the US?

I'd laugh at that, but I'm a little too cynical to think that the NSA isn't entirely likely to get the IRS to throw a "parallel reconstructed" Capone style charge at him just to avoid having to go to court and admit any of their myriad of best-practice security failings…

As a US citizen the answer is always 'yes' even if you lived on the moon.

Since he can never return to the US anyway, there are charges against him, it is kind of pointless.

But on the off chance there's some loophole in Russian law (or the laws of some country he passes through in the future) that makes extradition to the US for tax evasion particularly easy, filing and paying his taxes may be worth the cost and effort.

Or if by some long shot some future president pardons him, he'll be glad he paid his taxes.

I'm not sure if Russia has a "double taxation" agreement with the US and a quick google doesn't immediately prsent an answer. If so, expats who pay taxes in Russia won't have to pay those same taxes in the US. As long as Snowden files his taxes, he won't be under a tax obligation or legal liability.

I am not a lawyer!

There is a US-Russia double taxation treaty.[0]

He'll be eligible for the foreign earned income exclusion by filing time. That protects US persons from double taxation up to about $100k of earned income, even without a tax treaty.

And he needs to remember to file his FBARs, too.

[0]http://www.irs.gov/Businesses/International-Businesses/Russi...

Maybe he's owed a return this year?

I'd assume he would. First of all it could be a risk not to and second, why wouldn't he?

https://wikileaks.org/freesnowden

Thanks for pointing that out but, to be clear, this fund is to feed the lawyers, not Mr Snowden.

That's legal defense, and I'm sure that's expensive. But what if we just want to send him some some money to reward him for making the sacrifice for all of us?

> Roland Tscheinig gave $4,000

> Thanks so much, Mr. Snowden,

> Your sense of initiative is commendable and should serve as a guiding light for all of us.

> Your contribution to our common future has been absolutely invaluable!

Holy crap, this guy puts his money where his mouth is.

Many of us here can afford to do the same. A very close friend and business partner gave a similar amount to help Star Simpson with her situation because he believed very strongly that she was a victim of the War on Dignity.

Star Simpson: http://boingboing.net/2008/09/22/star-simpson-one-yea.html

Being able to afford it and actually doing it are two very different things.

Wow, I remember that. Did you know that she's the one who did that Taco Copter thing they were talking about on here a few months ago?? Cool.

Even better, she does things that aren't pranks!

http://canidu.com/

Don't get me wrong. Taco Copter is an excellent prank, and both of the pranksters involved are worth keeping an eye on.

Especially if they can get into your home, laptop, or vehicle ;-)

It's interesting that many of the higher donations are from Germany.

Yeah, I noticed that as well. Anyone willing to speculate?

Well looking at the comments, some germans make comparisons to growing up in east germany, the stasi, etc. And germany is the better performing economy in europe right now.

People who grew up in Cold War West Germany (like me) got fed the propaganda that mass surveillance is totalitarian, communist evil because communist East Germany was infamous for it, so they are more likely to view these things as a serious infraction.

I think Germany has the strongest anti-surveillance, pro-privacy movement in the world in general. We have a special word for it "Datenschutz" ("data protection"), which means:

- protection against information about you being recorded without your consent

- information about you being passed around without your consent

We have a lot of Datenschutz laws and activists. And well the activists tend to be IT guys, and those tend to be well-paid. So lots of activist money available for the cause.

But you in Germany seem happy with ID cards and reporting house moves to a police department which struck me as very odd given the recent history and especially the stazi in East Germany

Id cards facilitate stop and search which is more worrying especially given the recent judgement by german judges that its fine to do this disappointingly to black citizens.

In both the UK and the USA - there is more disquiet about this than what the NSA and GCHQ get up to.

Our history probably has something to do with it, but its also an issue of the media raising awareness since the 70s. Be this out of fear-mongering to boost sales or of a sincere feeling of responsibility, it has influenced the views on privacy and surveillance of a large part of the population.

Its not just the Stasi btw., one of the canonical examples is the Nazis use of data to find and select the jews in the holocaust. This has influenced what is allowed - and especially what not - to be stored about each citizen in Germany tremendously.

Disclaimer: I'm german.

Surely there must be news organisations willing to pay for interviews?

He may have to, but it will be a desperate move. Think about the risks involved.

The US government:

- spends billions on illicit surveillance tech

- officially sanctions kidnapping ("extraordinary rendition") as a tool of security policy

- brought down an Ecuadorian diplomatic flight over European airspace, on the mere possibility that he might be on it

- fully intends to lock him up in a cage forever and ever and ever

You pretty much just described Batman.

Ah... best comment all year!

Interesting point. Which side do you think the Caped Crusader would take?

based on the fact that he gave Fox control to destroy his cell phone surveillance. I think he would be pro snowden

Based on the fact that he had a cell phone surveillance system, he'd probably be pro-NSA.

I'm enjoying this.

Batman is an amazingly great epitome of libertarian paradox.

That's why he's always so moody. Cognitive dissonance.

I'd go even further to say that's why he is one of the most compelling superheros

...wish fulfillment power fantasy is not my idea of a compelling character.

I'm talking about the dissonance of his figure, and I think you realize that. I didn't say every single facet of the character was compelling.

Didn't he decide that the thing he set up was too powerful for anyone to have though?

(in at least one version, iirc, etc. etc.)

Sure, but that didn't stop him from using it, did it?

Yes - because he was the only one morally sound enough, in his opinion, to use it. Much like the NSA and GCHQ.

We like our superheroes to kick some villain's butt without pesky 'due process' getting in the way.

Kinda like the NSA, if you think about it.

Batman prefers due process.

After he's kidnapped you.

"I'd like you to meet the bastions of justice, my right jab Due and my left hook Process. Say hello!"

-- Batman

The whole premise of the movie was that sometimes that kind of surveillance is necessary to save society.

But the person who controlled that surveillance knew when to destroy it.

That comment made HN a better place.

He was given asylum by the Russian government, snatching him from Russian soil would be a major thing that could possibly start a war.

Get real.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poisoning_of_Alexander_Litvinen...

http://edition.cnn.com/2013/07/02/world/americas/bolivia-pre...

I see no shots being fired.

Russia is not going to start a war with the United States over Snowden.

Or: Obama is not going to start a war with Putin over Snowden. They're already spread thin (Syira, Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran, Korea, Pacific, etc).

Lol.. the US is to Russia what North Korea is to the US - a small nuisance. Talking about Obama starting a war with Russia is a ridiculous fantasy. Heck, the US has lost every single war it started over the past two decades - even to the poorest and least organized enemies you can imagine.

"the US is to Russia what North Korea is to the US - a small nuisance."

Ha. The US military is just slightly more advanced than whatever North Korea has. In terms of sheer firepower, the US military is formidable. These so-called "lost wars" aren't pitting nation against nation, which is what US vs. Russia would be.

I'm disappointed this is the case (as a fiscally conservative US citizen), but most our of aircraft carriers have superior air firepower onboard than most countries have entirely.

"One US aircraft carrier has a more powerful air force than 70% of all countries." http://www.dump.com/aircraftcarrier/

How did the US lose the first Gulf War? I think Iraq was removed from Kuwait right?

Technically older than the last two decades?

The "wars" were won quite convincingly. They were over before they started. The problem is that the wars did not end up resulting in the kind of postwar peace envisioned after about 2001 or so (an issue that Clausewitz pointed out in the 1830s).

More likely a strong tsk tsk in a passing speech.

So all that, and you think the US intelligence community don't actually know exactly where he is?

Also, interviews can and do frequently happen without disclosing the exact location of the subject.

> - brought down an Ecuadorian diplomatic flight over European airspace, on the mere possibility that he might be on it

To be clear it wasn't just any diplomatic flight. It was the plane carrying the President of Ecuador.

If I were Snowden, I'd make sure all documents leak completely if anything like that happens to me. It'd be then the best interest of the US I die of old age a good couple decades from now.

Snowden is not an amateur (like me). He has insurance all over the place.

Don't have to help for now, says in the fourth paragraph he's got a new job.

yes, that is an odd contradiction between the paragraph and the title.

The need to put a tidbit of information out like that from his lawyer seems more to me to be a bid to counter the claims that he is being run by a foreign intel service who some might assume would have given him large sums of cash for his continuing to stay in Russia in public silence.

His parents could set up a kickstarter/indiegogo/paypal. They wouldn't have to name Snowden in the plea for funds, could be named the "Freedom Fund". So, donators wouldn't be charged with aiding a felon.

"Good luck with that." is all I'm saying.

If the donors know it's for Snowden, the courts would as well.

Is he actually a felon?

Would a contribution be tax deductible?

Probably not! Donations are only tax deductible if they're to registered charities, and usually only if the charity is in the same country in which you're a taxpayer.

Darn! The irony would be incomparable!

So what you're telling us is that being a whistleblower and fleeing to Russia turns out to be a poor career move?

Let this be a warning to all you crazy kids out there thinking you can take on the man and not get busted.

Right, don't bother exposing the biggest Constitutional violation of this century, because you might have to take on a part-time job while you're in exile...

(If you weren't serious, I apologize!)

I wasn't. Anyway, poor bugger. He will never work for anyone remotely connected to any government institution or any multinational in any country. The US is so omnipotent and omnipresent that even the Chinese, Ecuadorians and earlier on, the Russians, were seemingly afraid to touch him.

He took on the man knowing he'd get busted.

"The American fugitive, who revealed troves of classified information as he fled the country in May and is now living under temporary asylum in Russia, reportedly started at a job at an unnamed Russian website earlier this month."

How do computer industry salaries in Russia compare with government contractor salaries in the United States? And how much of whatever money people send to Snowden will end up with Snowden, and how much with Snowden's lawyer? (Another issue is whether the one-year asylum offered by Russia will be extended later or not. What will Snowden do if Russia decides not to continue to grant him permission to be in Russia and work there?)

What would happen if he ran out of money? Wouldn't Russia just... give him some? I can hardly think it would be in the diplomatic interest of Russia for Snowden to become unable to pay his lawyer.

Having the government pay for your lawyer and being broke are not mutually exclusive (and that's assuming Russia sees some benefit to providing him counsel). Not sure why Russia would give him any money, what does the money buy them? They could probably put a roof over his head if they really wanted but that's still a far cry from not being broke.

Also, I think that "putting a roof over someone's head" and "putting a roof over someone who US government really wants to get" cost slightly different.

Do you think Russia really gives a shit anymore? Enough to throw money at him?

So what punishment would be he experience if he was to return?

It sounds like he is not "free" now. He would be a high profile prisoner. How bad would the government treat him?

I imagine he'd be tortured.

At least he is free.

How the world changed...

We could set something up to donate to him? I think we owe him a hell of a lot. Allowing him to live comfortably is the least we can do. Do you think if a fund was set up it would be hijacked by the U.S?

i thought he got a job??

He got NSAxed.

He probably did; but at this point you have to assume that any media you receive on the topic of Edward Snowden is a calculated ploy for someone's agenda. Whether it's Wikileaks trying to embarrass the US .gov or the Intelligence Community trying to discredit Snowden and by extension all whistleblowers. Anything you read about Snowden has been pushed or spun by by someone. The man himself may be miserable, or comfortable; we have no idea and I'd guess he likes his privacy. But the persona of Edward Snowden that is reenacted on blogs, television, etc.; that is a complete fabrication that is always already a lie in some direction or another.

would it be considered treason to send him money as a US citizen? I could imagine he could fetch a pretty penny consulting on russian sites about security issues (even if he isn't the top guy in the field, he has a crazy name recognition right now).

Only "light treason"

No he isn't, he's the richest amongst us.

Care to expand on that?

Rich in Karma.

Maybe he should ask Putin for some spare change.

Snowden could write a book and make millions. This profit potential means he's not "broke" in the same sense a typical broke person is.

I'd imagine he'd have a hard time getting someone to publish & distribute that book (in the USA, at least)...

I was wondering about this the other day. I'm sure someone will help him out.

What? Treason doesn't pay?

Lots of americans wouldn't agree that he committed a treason. And not just americans, btw. Disclosing such acts of violation of your Constitution is a necessity, not a treason. It isn't the case where it would have been better not to know about it.

It paid off for our founding fathers.

I have too much respect for you, Marc, to think you're doing anything other than joking but it's still disappointing and not really funny.

Remember all the people in Germany during WWII (*sorry for the tired analogy) who could have spoken up and didn't. I guess they did the right thing. They certainly wouldn't want to commit treason -- it doesn't pay.

Sure it does. Just ask NSA/CIA. They betray their country and ideals it was founded on, on a millisecond basis.

But you need to be on the right side to get all the fat loot.

I have very little sympathy for his monetary plight. He made his bed, let him sleep in it.

Or rather, when your giant paycheck comes from the government, maybe torquing off that government in the most flamboyant way possible isn't the best of ideas.

Yeh, let's all roll over. Who would want to do the right thing when you can do the easy thing?

Who's saying he did the right thing? There's more then 1 perspective on this.

The opposite argument to saying he did the moral thing is to say he did the immoral thing, not to say "serves him right for upsetting the people paying his salary"

I would argue other wise, on two counts. What I said was that I have no sympathy for him biting the hand that feeds.

Second, I think that the situation has been vastly over complicated by attempts to colour matters as some sort of grand moral crusade. Snowden is not a white knight, nor is he a traitor. He's a man who did what he thought was right. I disagree with his methods, and think that his actions (leaking to journalists rather than going through the appropriate oversight channels (or even just dropping a USB drive off at his Congressman's office, with a break down of what it all means)) negates any sort of 'moral right' that the community has been ascribing to Snowden.

The moral crusade is against the NSA, not for Snowden. There's a distinct difference between the two.

Yes, a Constitutional one and an unconstitutional one.

Yeah you are right. There is no doubt that revealing the truth is a disobedient act and must be severely punished in order to restore peace and public blindness. Now watch TV and go to sleep and feed the economy, will ya?

There's an irony in how aggressive people are in downvoting any comment which doesn't toe the "Snowden is clearly right" line loudly.

Dissent, ironically, must be crushed on this issue it seems.

It's not like you're making an argument, you just call what some would consider doing the public a service "torquing off that government in the most flamboyant way possible". If you're gonna dissent, argue... but don't be silly, and then pretend the reaction to that sillyness is an argument ;)

You might note I'm not the author of the comment you're referring to.

I'm very disappointed with people that share your attitude. He gave up a lot to disclose unethical (and downright illegal) behaviour - for the betterment of society, knowing full-well the consequences. He also explicitly stated that this was not about him - so your flamboyant statements are WAY off the mark.

Here's the tip: research a topic before posting misinformation, unless you endorse breaching the 4th amendment, and lies all the way from Obama down.

But ... i'm heartened that very few people share your view.

So true. The comments section on time.com almost got me a heart attack. Thought that HN would not be infected with that breed of ignorant nationalistic sheeps.. Thank you for restoring my faith

If he wanted to do the right thing, he should have gone to his Congressman, or the oversight arm of the NSA (it does exist, regardless of how inefficient it seems to be).

I'm stuck in the odd position of thinking both Snowden and the government are wrong, which seems to piss both sets of hardliners off. I'm not arguing that the NSA is right to slurp our data, and I'm not trying to defend that - I think it's reprehensible. However, I also think that Snowden did not exhaust all his legal options before deciding to play secret agent and scarper off to Hong Kong. I think if it truly wasn't about him, he wouldn't have gone to the press first thing. If he'd been shutdown after going through those channels? Sure, leak everything. He chose instead to play the hero.

So I guess you're not going to say thank you.

Wow, you are a dick. Or completely clueless.

please replace "or" with and

Well, yes I am a dick, but I also think the situation is more nuanced than 'rah rah free Snowden'.

Sorry, the comment you're replying to makes an actual argument. Your reply of "wow, you're a dick" does not.

I find no objection that dead_phish should express this view if that's how he feels. It is a valid viewpoint even if it is not shared. I also commend him for expressing it in a community like HN which, let's be honest, does not tolerate dissenting views of Snowden.

It's kind of sad that his dissenting view is downvoted and your name-calling is not.

Thank you. I was a little disturbed by how quickly this turned to "you're an ass for not thinking this way." I expected disagreement, but not, well, so much rage.

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