Epstein Secrets

have access to the Level 3 documents stored in these compartments. Nor, as was discussed earlier, was he given access to them when he transferred to Booz Allen because he had not completed the requisite training. Snowden had also, it will be recalled, relinquished his privileges as a system administrator wh

interest in exposing the NSA’s secrets, this person could supply him with the necessary guidance, steering a still unsuspecting Snowden first to the Booz Allen position and afterwards to his associates in Hong Kong. By taking sole credit for the coup in the video that he made with Poitras and Greenwald in Ho

mestic Surveillance Under Obama.” Along with it was the FISA warrant to Verizon. The PRISM story broke hours later in the Washington Post. Written by Gellman and Poitras, it claimed that the NSA and FBI were tapping directly into the central servers of nine leading U.S, Internet companies which were knowin

e name and provided his credit card, but he was he in contact with three high-profile journalists, two well-known hacktavists and, as he suggested to Gellman, a foreign diplomatic mission. Even if Snowden had failed to persuade the Washington Post to publish a coded identifier, the mission’s interest would

lso be targeted in enemy ter- ritories. Although repairing the damage might take many “decades,” according to Michael McConnell, the vice-chairman of Booz Allen, the new director had to get on with that task. McConnell, a for- | | Epst_9780451494566_2p_all_r1.indd 207 @ 9/30/16 8:13AM | | HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_01

ntruthful about his degree in computer sciences, he not only had a SCI secu- rity clearance but was willing to take a cut in pay. In keeping with the Booz Allen business plan, such a recruit provided another cog in its profit machine. Not only had the NSA outsourced much of its computer opera- | | Epst_9780

ts that could undo the NSA’s intelligence gathering as “the single point of failure.” While still shielding his own identity in May 2013, he wrote to Gellman that U.S. intelligence “will most certainly kill you if they think you are the single point of failure that could stop this disclosure and make them

the Level 3 breach was switching jobs on March 15th 2013. Snowden chose to leave his job as a system administrator at Dell SecureWorks to take job at Booz Allen as an analyst-in-training. His motive was not money, as it was a lower- paying position. At the time, he made this choice he had already set up an en

se” in Hawaii with his girl friend. Yet he chose to move to Booz Allen he also greatly increased the risk of exposure because the auditing system at Booz Allen could trace back unauthorized copying (though not in real time.) Presumably he knew, as he later told Greenwald and Poitras, that stealing documents

ed rendezvous with a journalist. As previously mentioned, when he left Hong Kong not a single journalist had agreed to meet him in Hong Kong. Indeed, Gellman considered Hong Kong, as he put it, “in the jurisdiction of a country that’s unfriendly to the United States,” and notified Snowden that he would not

. It did not change that decision even after it found out about his subterfuge. According to Admiral McConnell, Snowden never actually worked in the Booz Allen offices, which are housed in a skyscraper in downtown Honolulu. Instead, he was immediately assigned to work at the NSA’s highly sensitive National T

e the American establishment. So he had Poitras write to Barton Gellman, the Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter for The Washington Post. Poitras had met Gellman in 2010, when they were both fellows at NYU’s Center on Law and Security. Poitras had requested help in encrypting her computer from Karen Greenberg,

nterest in exposing the NSA’s secrets, this person could sup- ply him with the necessary guidance, steering a still-unsuspecting Snowden first to the Booz Allen position and afterward to his associ- ates in Hong Kong. By taking sole credit for the coup in the video that he made with Poitras and Greenwald in H

s scale of domestic surveillance under Obama.” Along with it was the FISA order. The PRISM story broke hours later in The Washington Post. Written by Gellman and Poitras, it claimed that the NSA and the FBI were tapping directly into the central servers of nine leading U.S. Internet companies, which were k

ndia?” Also, Shilpa Phadnis, “Edward Snowden Sharpened His Hacking Skills in Delhi,” Times of India, Dec. 4, 2013. 33 “It is a dead-end job”: Former Booz Allen official who requested anonymity, interview with author. 33 shaded by a sakura: The description of Snowden’s life in Maryland comes entirely from Li

”: Shils, Torment of Secrecy. 47 “|The elites] know everything”: Roy, “Edward Snowden Meets Arundhati Roy and John Cusack.” 47 “What do you think”: Gellman, “Edward Snowden, After Months of NSA Rev- elations, Says His Mission’s Accomplished.” 48 violate U.S. espionage laws: Michael Hayden, interview wit

it did not change that decision even after it found out about his subterfuge.). According to Admiral McConnell, Snowden never actually worked in the Booz Allen offices, which are housed in a skyscraper in downtown Honolulu. Instead, he was immediately assigned to work at the NSA’s highly-sensitive National O

s for his journalistic event. He was also apparently in contact with at least one foreign mission during this period, according to what he written to Gellman on May 25". In that email concerning when and how his story was to be published by the Washington Post, Snowden even asked Gellman to include in it s