Epstein Secrets

d contact with Snowden a year earlier, Unfortunately, that room was occupied, but I was given a nearby room that served my purpose. Snowden had told Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras, the Guardian reporters he met in Hong Kong, that he had hidden out at the Mira hotel since his arrival in Hong Kong because he fea

he later said, she was in charge of their “operational security.” When they finally settled at a table in the nearly empty restau- rant, she showed Greenwald e-mails she had received from Citizen Four. Greenwald, as he recounted, made “no connection” to the “long-forgotten emails” he had received from Snowden

to his interview- ers, as a character in Joseph Heller’s Catch-22 famously said, “Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t after you.” Runa Sandvik, a close associate of Appelbaum’s, also worked tirelessly to extend Tor’s cloak of anonymity in the private sector against the surveillance of the NS

st you try the lounge instead. I’ll offer to show you where it is, @ and at that point we’re good. You simply need to follow naturally.” According to Greenwald’s account, Snowden changed the plan to the upper lobby. “We were to go to the third floor,” Greenwald writes. “We were to wait on a couch near a ‘gia

ty for what would turn out to be the largest theft of top secret documents in the his- tory of U.S. intelligence. In the video, it will be recalled, Glenn Greenwald, who had bro- ken the NSA story in The Guardian, questioned Snowden. What was his motive? Greenwald asked. Why did he do it? Snowden replied that he

May 20. Snowden was anything but discreet in his contacts with strang- ers in the anti-surveillance movement, including such well-known activists as Runa Sandvik (to whom he revealed his true name and address via e-mail), Micah Lee, Jacob Appelbaum, Parker Higgins, and Laura Poitras. “It is not statistically i

technology operative for the Freedom of the Press Foundation; Jacob Appelbaum, the Tor proselytizer; Ben Wizner, the ACLU lawyer; Barton Gellman; and Glenn Greenwald. “It is not me that can’t keep a secret,” Abraham Lincoln joked. “It’s the people I | | Epst_9780451494566_2p_all_r1.indd 231 @ 9/30/16 8:13AM | |

’t.” In the same vein, Poitras could hardly rely on these five confidants not to tell her secrets (and Snowden’s) to others. Hours after he was told, Greenwald told his lover, David Miranda, about the source in great detail. He even asked him to evaluate the source’s bona fides for him. Gellman, for his part

wden himself overly discreet. It will be recalled that he had also advertised his Tor-sponsored CryptoParty activities over the Internet and supplied Runa Sandvik, who worked with Appel- baum, his true name and address in Hawaii. Sandvik had no reason not to share the identity of her co-presenter with others in

ibson in New York “The Guinness is good.” It was a pre-arranged code by which MacAskill certified Snowden’s credibility for the Guardian. Gibson told Greenwald to proceed with the story. Greenwald wrote his first story about NSA transgression based almost entirely on the FISA watrant that Snowden had copie

evealed to Wizner that she had found an anonymous source with access to U.S. government surveillance secrets. So he was not completely surprised when Glenn Greenwald, Poitras’ writing partner, asked him in July 2013 to contact Snowden in Russia. Snowden offered an opportunity for Wizner since the ACLU already had

discussed earlier, was anything but discrete in his contacts with strangers in the anti-surveillance movement, including such well known activists as Runa Sandvik (who he supplied his true name and address via email), Micah Lee, Jacob Appelbaum, Parker Higgins, and Laura Poitras. “It is not statistically improb