mister_geaux

Thanks for your answer, thanks for doing this AMA, and thanks for your tireless work. I mean, literally, I read your Twitter feed: you should sleep more.

This addresses a question I asked elsewhere, so I'll restate it here: Snowden has said he wants to be "part of the debate" over global surveillance. Can you speak to when and how he can best rejoin that debate? You seem to suggest that it's best if he just stays out of it from now on, to avoid personalizing the story or giving grist to people who want to portray him as a megalomaniac.

I understand the argument that keeping him removed from the spotlight is productive; on the other hand, in his limited interviews with you and in his Guardian Q&A, he was cogent, knowledgeable, and compelling. I don't feel guilty for wanting to hear more from him.

As an employee of Google, and someone who has worked with the NSA, can you talk a bit about how the two organizations, in their own ways, threaten privacy, and why you feel threatened by one more than the other? Should we be more worried about secret abuses at our Internet companies, or within our government? Why?

Well, he doesn't HAVE to answer, of course... but unless English has been radically redefined, I think this forum is called "ask me anything".

But no government agency has direct access to our systems and we have often pushed back on government demand that are overbroad or otherwise don’t satisfy legal requirements.

According to an appellate court, the requests themselves don't "satisfy legal requirements." I find assurances like this very hollow: the laws are written and interpreted so broadly that almost anything can be claimed to "satisfy legal requirements" by SOMEONE, and because these claims are often secret, they don't get judicial review.

Can you explain in layman's terms what sorts of requests are "overbroad" and how exactly you push back when a government official says a request is legal and your legal team either disagrees or is unsure if the government is interpreting their authorization appropriately?

If this is addressed elsewhere in this AMA, please feel free to refer me.