Edward Snowden: Criminal or Model Citizen?

If everything Edward Snowden says is true, he is a criminal whose actions may have endangered American lives. He is also a conscientious citizen, risking career and liberty to expose what he believes to be grave wrongdoing. This is the paradox underlying government surveillance programs in general, and in particular the shaky foundations of the U.S. national security apparatus.

Snowden, an employee of Booz Allen Hamilton working in Hawaii as a contractor for the National Security Agency, has revealed himself as the source of leaks about a program called Prism, which allows the NSA to collect and mine user data from companies such as Google Inc., Facebook Inc. and Microsoft Corp. Until recently, according to news media reports, Snowden was holed up in a Hong Kong hotel; he says he intends to seek asylum from “any countries that believe in free speech.”