Lawrence Lessig writes in the Daily Beast today about the relationship between the internet and civil liberties principles, in the wake of Edward Snowden's NSA surveillance leak.
"We don’t know yet whether Snowden is telling the truth," says Lessig. Not that he doubts Snowden, or doesn't, it's just that we literally can't know how much of it is true, because it's all secret.
But what we do know are the questions that ought to be asked in response to his claims. And specifically, this: Is it really the case that the government has entrusted our privacy to the good judgment of private analysts? Are there really no code-based controls for assuring that specific surveillance is specifically justified? And what is the technology for assuring that rogues paid by our government can’t use data collected by our government for purposes that none within our government would openly and publicly defend?
Lessig is on Bill Moyers' show tonight, also. Worth watching.
