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There is an entire genre of YouTube videos

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devoted to an experience which

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I am certain that everyone in this room has had.

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It entails an individual who,

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thinking they're alone,

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engages in some expressive behavior —

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wild singing, gyrating dancing,

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some mild sexual activity —

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only to discover that, in fact, they are not alone,

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that there is a person watching and lurking,

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the discovery of which causes them

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to immediately cease what they were doing

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in horror.

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The sense of shame and humiliation

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in their face is palpable.

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It's the sense of,

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"This is something I'm willing to do

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only if no one else is watching."

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This is the crux of the work

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on which I have been singularly focused

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for the last 16 months,

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the question of why privacy matters,

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a question that has arisen

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in the context of a global debate,

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enabled by the revelations of Edward Snowden

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that the United States and its partners,

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unbeknownst to the entire world,

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has converted the Internet,

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once heralded as an unprecedented tool

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of liberation and democratization,

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into an unprecedented zone

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of mass, indiscriminate surveillance.

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There is a very common sentiment

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that arises in this debate,

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even among people who are uncomfortable

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with mass surveillance, which says

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that there is no real harm

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that comes from this large-scale invasion

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because only people who are engaged in bad acts

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have a reason to want to hide

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and to care about their privacy.

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This worldview is implicitly grounded

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in the proposition that there are
two kinds of people in the world,

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good people and bad people.

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Bad people are those who plot terrorist attacks

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or who engage in violent criminality

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and therefore have reasons to
want to hide what they're doing,

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have reasons to care about their privacy.

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But by contrast, good people

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are people who go to work,

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come home, raise their children, watch television.

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They use the Internet not to plot bombing attacks

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but to read the news or exchange recipes

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or to plan their kids' Little League games,

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and those people are doing nothing wrong

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and therefore have nothing to hide

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and no reason to fear

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the government monitoring them.

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The people who are actually saying that

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are engaged in a very extreme act

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of self-deprecation.

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What they're really saying is,

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"I have agreed to make myself

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such a harmless and unthreatening

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and uninteresting person that I actually don't fear

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having the government know what it is that I'm doing."

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This mindset has found what I think

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is its purest expression

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in a 2009 interview with

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the longtime CEO of Google, Eric Schmidt, who,

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when asked about all the different ways his company

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is causing invasions of privacy

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for hundreds of millions of people around the world,

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said this: He said,

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"If you're doing something that you don't want

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other people to know,

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maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place."

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Now, there's all kinds of things to say about

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that mentality,

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the first of which is that the people who say that,

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who say that privacy isn't really important,

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they don't actually believe it,

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and the way you know that
they don't actually believe it

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is that while they say with their
words that privacy doesn't matter,

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with their actions, they take all kinds of steps

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to safeguard their privacy.

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They put passwords on their email

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and their social media accounts,

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they put locks on their bedroom

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and bathroom doors,

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all steps designed to prevent other people

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from entering what they consider their private realm

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and knowing what it is that they
don't want other people to know.

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The very same Eric Schmidt, the CEO of Google,

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ordered his employees at Google

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to cease speaking with the online

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Internet magazine CNET

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after CNET published an article

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full of personal, private information

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about Eric Schmidt,

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which it obtained exclusively
through Google searches

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and using other Google products. (Laughter)

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This same division can be seen

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with the CEO of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg,

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who in an infamous interview in 2010

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pronounced that privacy is no longer

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a "social norm."

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Last year, Mark Zuckerberg and his new wife

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purchased not only their own house

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but also all four adjacent houses in Palo Alto

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for a total of 30 million dollars

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in order to ensure that they enjoyed a zone of privacy

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that prevented other people from monitoring

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what they do in their personal lives.

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Over the last 16 months, as I've
debated this issue around the world,

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every single time somebody has said to me,

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"I don't really worry about invasions of privacy

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because I don't have anything to hide."

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I always say the same thing to them.

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I get out a pen, I write down my email address.

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I say, "Here's my email address.

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What I want you to do when you get home

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is email me the passwords

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to all of your email accounts,

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not just the nice, respectable work one in your name,

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but all of them,

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because I want to be able to just troll through

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what it is you're doing online,

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read what I want to read and
publish whatever I find interesting.

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After all, if you're not a bad person,

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if you're doing nothing wrong,

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you should have nothing to hide."

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Not a single person has taken me up on that offer.

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I check and — (Applause)

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I check that email account religiously all the time.

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It's a very desolate place.

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And there's a reason for that,

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which is that we as human beings,

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even those of us who in words

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disclaim the importance of our own privacy,

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instinctively understand

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the profound importance of it.

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It is true that as human beings, we're social animals,

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which means we have a need for other people

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to know what we're doing and saying and thinking,

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which is why we voluntarily publish
information about ourselves online.

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But equally essential to what it means

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to be a free and fulfilled human being

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is to have a place that we can go

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and be free of the judgmental eyes of other people.

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There's a reason why we seek that out,

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and our reason is that all of us —

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not just terrorists and criminals, all of us —

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have things to hide.

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There are all sorts of things that we do and think

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that we're willing to tell our physician

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or our lawyer or our psychologist or our spouse

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or our best friend that we would be mortified

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for the rest of the world to learn.

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We make judgments every single day

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about the kinds of things that we say and think and do

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that we're willing to have other people know,

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and the kinds of things that we say and think and do

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that we don't want anyone else to know about.

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People can very easily in words claim

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that they don't value their privacy,

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but their actions negate the authenticity of that belief.

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Now, there's a reason why privacy is so craved

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universally and instinctively.

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It isn't just a reflexive movement

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like breathing air or drinking water.

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The reason is that when we're in a state

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where we can be monitored,
where we can be watched,

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our behavior changes dramatically.

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The range of behavioral options that we consider

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when we think we're being watched

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severely reduce.

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This is just a fact of human nature

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that has been recognized in social science

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and in literature and in religion

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and in virtually every field of discipline.

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There are dozens of psychological studies

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that prove that when somebody knows

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that they might be watched,

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the behavior they engage in

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is vastly more conformist and compliant.

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Human shame is a very powerful motivator,

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as is the desire to avoid it,

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and that's the reason why people,

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when they're in a state of
being watched, make decisions

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not that are the byproduct of their own agency

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but that are about the expectations

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that others have of them

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or the mandates of societal orthodoxy.

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This realization was exploited most powerfully

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for pragmatic ends by the 18th-
century philosopher Jeremy Bentham,

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who set out to resolve an important problem

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ushered in by the industrial age,

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where, for the first time, institutions had become

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so large and centralized

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that they were no longer able to monitor

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and therefore control each one
of their individual members,

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and the solution that he devised

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was an architectural design

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originally intended to be implemented in prisons

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that he called the panopticon,

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the primary attribute of which was the construction

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of an enormous tower in the center of the institution

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where whoever controlled the institution

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could at any moment watch any of the inmates,

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although they couldn't watch all of them at all times.

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And crucial to this design

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was that the inmates could not actually

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see into the panopticon, into the tower,

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and so they never knew

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if they were being watched or even when.

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And what made him so excited about this discovery

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was that that would mean that the prisoners

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would have to assume that they were being watched

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at any given moment,

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which would be the ultimate enforcer

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for obedience and compliance.

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The 20th-century French philosopher Michel Foucault

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realized that that model could be used

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not just for prisons but for every institution

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that seeks to control human behavior:

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schools, hospitals, factories, workplaces.

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And what he said was that this mindset,

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this framework discovered by Bentham,

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was the key means of societal control

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for modern, Western societies,

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which no longer need

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the overt weapons of tyranny —

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punishing or imprisoning or killing dissidents,

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or legally compelling loyalty to a particular party —

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because mass surveillance creates

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a prison in the mind

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that is a much more subtle

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though much more effective means

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of fostering compliance with social norms

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or with social orthodoxy,

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much more effective

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than brute force could ever be.

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The most iconic work of literature about surveillance

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and privacy is the George Orwell novel "1984,"

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which we all learn in school, and
therefore it's almost become a cliche.

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In fact, whenever you bring it up
in a debate about surveillance,

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people instantaneously dismiss it

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as inapplicable, and what they say is,

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"Oh, well in '1984,' there were
monitors in people's homes,

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they were being watched at every given moment,

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and that has nothing to do with
the surveillance state that we face."

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That is an actual fundamental misapprehension

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of the warnings that Orwell issued in "1984."

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The warning that he was issuing

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was about a surveillance state

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not that monitored everybody at all times,

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but where people were aware that they could

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be monitored at any given moment.

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Here is how Orwell's narrator, Winston Smith,

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described the surveillance system

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that they faced:

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"There was, of course, no way of knowing

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whether you were being watched
at any given moment."

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He went on to say,

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"At any rate, they could plug in your wire

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whenever they wanted to.

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You had to live, did live,

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00:10:55,742 --> 00:10:57,995
from habit that became instinct,

270
00:10:57,995 --> 00:11:00,490
in the assumption that every sound you made

271
00:11:00,490 --> 00:11:02,680
was overheard and except in darkness

272
00:11:02,680 --> 00:11:05,419
every movement scrutinized."

273
00:11:05,419 --> 00:11:08,765
The Abrahamic religions similarly posit

274
00:11:08,765 --> 00:11:11,708
that there's an invisible, all-knowing authority

275
00:11:11,708 --> 00:11:13,451
who, because of its omniscience,

276
00:11:13,451 --> 00:11:15,347
always watches whatever you're doing,

277
00:11:15,347 --> 00:11:18,120
which means you never have a private moment,

278
00:11:18,120 --> 00:11:19,804
the ultimate enforcer

279
00:11:19,804 --> 00:11:22,794
for obedience to its dictates.

280
00:11:22,794 --> 00:11:26,198
What all of these seemingly disparate works

281
00:11:26,198 --> 00:11:28,984
recognize, the conclusion that they all reach,

282
00:11:28,984 --> 00:11:31,306
is that a society in which people

283
00:11:31,306 --> 00:11:33,613
can be monitored at all times

284
00:11:33,613 --> 00:11:36,268
is a society that breeds conformity

285
00:11:36,268 --> 00:11:38,510
and obedience and submission,

286
00:11:38,510 --> 00:11:40,021
which is why every tyrant,

287
00:11:40,021 --> 00:11:42,103
the most overt to the most subtle,

288
00:11:42,103 --> 00:11:44,366
craves that system.

289
00:11:44,366 --> 00:11:47,020
Conversely, even more importantly,

290
00:11:47,020 --> 00:11:49,460
it is a realm of privacy,

291
00:11:49,460 --> 00:11:52,470
the ability to go somewhere where we can think

292
00:11:52,470 --> 00:11:55,628
and reason and interact and speak

293
00:11:55,628 --> 00:11:59,282
without the judgmental eyes
of others being cast upon us,

294
00:11:59,282 --> 00:12:02,825
in which creativity and exploration

295
00:12:02,825 --> 00:12:05,853
and dissent exclusively reside,

296
00:12:05,853 --> 00:12:07,674
and that is the reason why,

297
00:12:07,674 --> 00:12:10,250
when we allow a society to exist

298
00:12:10,250 --> 00:12:12,413
in which we're subject to constant monitoring,

299
00:12:12,413 --> 00:12:15,390
we allow the essence of human freedom

300
00:12:15,390 --> 00:12:18,341
to be severely crippled.

301
00:12:18,341 --> 00:12:21,463
The last point I want to observe about this mindset,

302
00:12:21,463 --> 00:12:23,388
the idea that only people who 
are doing something wrong

303
00:12:23,388 --> 00:12:27,270
have things to hide and therefore
reasons to care about privacy,

304
00:12:27,270 --> 00:12:31,276
is that it entrenches two very destructive messages,

305
00:12:31,276 --> 00:12:33,304
two destructive lessons,

306
00:12:33,304 --> 00:12:35,060
the first of which is that

307
00:12:35,060 --> 00:12:37,180
the only people who care about privacy,

308
00:12:37,180 --> 00:12:39,236
the only people who will seek out privacy,

309
00:12:39,236 --> 00:12:43,311
are by definition bad people.

310
00:12:43,311 --> 00:12:45,443
This is a conclusion that we should have

311
00:12:45,443 --> 00:12:47,971
all kinds of reasons for avoiding,

312
00:12:47,971 --> 00:12:50,723
the most important of which is that when you say,

313
00:12:50,723 --> 00:12:53,100
"somebody who is doing bad things,"

314
00:12:53,100 --> 00:12:55,937
you probably mean things
like plotting a terrorist attack

315
00:12:55,937 --> 00:12:57,978
or engaging in violent criminality,

316
00:12:57,978 --> 00:13:00,518
a much narrower conception

317
00:13:00,518 --> 00:13:02,970
of what people who wield power mean

318
00:13:02,970 --> 00:13:05,020
when they say, "doing bad things."

319
00:13:05,020 --> 00:13:07,327
For them, "doing bad things" typically means

320
00:13:07,327 --> 00:13:10,398
doing something that poses meaningful challenges

321
00:13:10,398 --> 00:13:13,503
to the exercise of our own power.

322
00:13:13,503 --> 00:13:15,453
The other really destructive

323
00:13:15,453 --> 00:13:17,361
and, I think, even more insidious lesson

324
00:13:17,361 --> 00:13:20,140
that comes from accepting this mindset

325
00:13:20,140 --> 00:13:22,906
is there's an implicit bargain

326
00:13:22,906 --> 00:13:26,250
that people who accept this mindset have accepted,

327
00:13:26,250 --> 00:13:27,705
and that bargain is this:

328
00:13:27,705 --> 00:13:29,677
If you're willing to render yourself

329
00:13:29,677 --> 00:13:31,779
sufficiently harmless,

330
00:13:31,779 --> 00:13:33,949
sufficiently unthreatening

331
00:13:33,949 --> 00:13:35,831
to those who wield political power,

332
00:13:35,831 --> 00:13:38,867
then and only then can you be free

333
00:13:38,867 --> 00:13:40,975
of the dangers of surveillance.

334
00:13:40,975 --> 00:13:43,360
It's only those who are dissidents,

335
00:13:43,360 --> 00:13:44,841
who challenge power,

336
00:13:44,841 --> 00:13:46,653
who have something to worry about.

337
00:13:46,653 --> 00:13:50,060
There are all kinds of reasons why we
should want to avoid that lesson as well.

338
00:13:50,060 --> 00:13:52,298
You may be a person who, right now,

339
00:13:52,298 --> 00:13:54,370
doesn't want to engage in that behavior,

340
00:13:54,370 --> 00:13:56,825
but at some point in the future you might.

341
00:13:56,825 --> 00:13:58,499
Even if you're somebody who decides

342
00:13:58,499 --> 00:14:00,264
that you never want to,

343
00:14:00,264 --> 00:14:01,898
the fact that there are other people

344
00:14:01,898 --> 00:14:04,102
who are willing to and able to resist

345
00:14:04,102 --> 00:14:06,136
and be adversarial to those in power —

346
00:14:06,136 --> 00:14:07,670
dissidents and journalists

347
00:14:07,670 --> 00:14:09,758
and activists and a whole range of others —

348
00:14:09,758 --> 00:14:12,252
is something that brings us all collective good

349
00:14:12,252 --> 00:14:15,230
that we should want to preserve.

350
00:14:15,230 --> 00:14:17,324
Equally critical is that the measure

351
00:14:17,324 --> 00:14:19,587
of how free a society is

352
00:14:19,587 --> 00:14:21,737
is not how it treats its good,

353
00:14:21,737 --> 00:14:24,200
obedient, compliant citizens,

354
00:14:24,200 --> 00:14:26,040
but how it treats its dissidents

355
00:14:26,040 --> 00:14:29,155
and those who resist orthodoxy.

356
00:14:29,155 --> 00:14:30,752
But the most important reason

357
00:14:30,752 --> 00:14:33,153
is that a system of mass surveillance

358
00:14:33,153 --> 00:14:35,770
suppresses our own freedom in all sorts of ways.

359
00:14:35,770 --> 00:14:37,571
It renders off-limits

360
00:14:37,571 --> 00:14:39,577
all kinds of behavioral choices

361
00:14:39,577 --> 00:14:43,130
without our even knowing that it's happened.

362
00:14:43,130 --> 00:14:45,612
The renowned socialist activist Rosa Luxemburg

363
00:14:45,612 --> 00:14:48,105
once said, "He who does not move

364
00:14:48,105 --> 00:14:51,461
does not notice his chains."

365
00:14:51,461 --> 00:14:53,150
We can try and render the chains

366
00:14:53,150 --> 00:14:56,239
of mass surveillance invisible or undetectable,

367
00:14:56,239 --> 00:14:58,905
but the constraints that it imposes on us

368
00:14:58,905 --> 00:15:01,450
do not become any less potent.

369
00:15:01,450 --> 00:15:03,058
Thank you very much.

370
00:15:03,058 --> 00:15:04,489
(Applause)

371
00:15:04,489 --> 00:15:05,996
Thank you.

372
00:15:05,996 --> 00:15:10,893
(Applause)

373
00:15:10,893 --> 00:15:13,280
Thank you.

374
00:15:13,280 --> 00:15:16,122
(Applause)

375
00:15:19,320 --> 00:15:21,612
Bruno Giussani: Glenn, thank you.

376
00:15:21,612 --> 00:15:23,901
The case is rather convincing, I have to say,

377
00:15:23,901 --> 00:15:25,466
but I want to bring you back

378
00:15:25,466 --> 00:15:28,817
to the last 16 months and to Edward Snowden

379
00:15:28,817 --> 00:15:30,882
for a few questions, if you don't mind.

380
00:15:30,882 --> 00:15:33,370
The first one is personal to you.

381
00:15:33,370 --> 00:15:36,411
We have all read about the arrest of your partner,

382
00:15:36,411 --> 00:15:39,721
David Miranda in London, and other difficulties,

383
00:15:39,721 --> 00:15:41,805
but I assume that

384
00:15:41,805 --> 00:15:45,161
in terms of personal engagement and risk,

385
00:15:45,161 --> 00:15:46,965
that the pressure on you is not that easy

386
00:15:46,965 --> 00:15:49,910
to take on the biggest sovereign 
organizations in the world.

387
00:15:49,910 --> 00:15:52,345
Tell us a little bit about that.

388
00:15:52,345 --> 00:15:54,000
Glenn Greenwald: You know, I think
one of the things that happens

389
00:15:54,000 --> 00:15:55,932
is that people's courage in this regard

390
00:15:55,932 --> 00:15:57,644
gets contagious,

391
00:15:57,644 --> 00:16:01,107
and so although I and the other
journalists with whom I was working

392
00:16:01,107 --> 00:16:02,643
were certainly aware of the risk —

393
00:16:02,643 --> 00:16:05,365
the United States continues to be
the most powerful country in the world

394
00:16:05,365 --> 00:16:07,363
and doesn't appreciate it when you

395
00:16:07,363 --> 00:16:09,285
disclose thousands of their secrets

396
00:16:09,285 --> 00:16:11,796
on the Internet at will —

397
00:16:11,796 --> 00:16:15,265
seeing somebody who is a 29-year-old

398
00:16:15,265 --> 00:16:17,284
ordinary person who grew up in

399
00:16:17,284 --> 00:16:19,597
a very ordinary environment

400
00:16:19,597 --> 00:16:23,320
exercise the degree of principled
courage that Edward Snowden risked,

401
00:16:23,320 --> 00:16:25,540
knowing that he was going to go
to prison for the rest of his life

402
00:16:25,540 --> 00:16:27,322
or that his life would unravel,

403
00:16:27,322 --> 00:16:29,297
inspired me and inspired other journalists

404
00:16:29,297 --> 00:16:31,120
and inspired, I think, people around the world,

405
00:16:31,120 --> 00:16:32,808
including future whistleblowers,

406
00:16:32,808 --> 00:16:36,323
to realize that they can engage
in that kind of behavior as well.

407
00:16:36,323 --> 00:16:38,809
BG: I'm curious about your
relationship with Ed Snowden,

408
00:16:38,809 --> 00:16:41,990
because you have spoken with him a lot,

409
00:16:41,990 --> 00:16:43,753
and you certainly continue doing so,

410
00:16:43,753 --> 00:16:46,389
but in your book, you never call him Edward,

411
00:16:46,389 --> 00:16:49,849
nor Ed, you say "Snowden." How come?

412
00:16:49,849 --> 00:16:51,493
GG: You know, I'm sure that's something

413
00:16:51,493 --> 00:16:54,824
for a team of psychologists to examine.
(Laughter)

414
00:16:54,824 --> 00:16:58,413
I don't really know. The reason I think that,

415
00:16:58,413 --> 00:17:01,967
one of the important objectives that he actually had,

416
00:17:01,967 --> 00:17:04,303
one of his, I think, most important tactics,

417
00:17:04,303 --> 00:17:06,510
was that he knew that one of the ways

418
00:17:06,510 --> 00:17:09,200
to distract attention from the
substance of the revelations

419
00:17:09,200 --> 00:17:11,850
would be to try and personalize the focus on him,

420
00:17:11,850 --> 00:17:13,917
and for that reason, he stayed out of the media.

421
00:17:13,917 --> 00:17:16,426
He tried not to ever have his personal life

422
00:17:16,426 --> 00:17:18,105
subject to examination,

423
00:17:18,105 --> 00:17:20,819
and so I think calling him Snowden

424
00:17:20,819 --> 00:17:24,393
is a way of just identifying him
as this important historical actor

425
00:17:24,393 --> 00:17:26,265
rather than trying to personalize him in a way

426
00:17:26,265 --> 00:17:29,145
that might distract attention from the substance.

427
00:17:29,145 --> 00:17:30,602
Moderator: So his revelations, your analysis,

428
00:17:30,602 --> 00:17:32,378
the work of other journalists,

429
00:17:32,378 --> 00:17:35,378
have really developed the debate,

430
00:17:35,378 --> 00:17:37,506
and many governments, for example, have reacted,

431
00:17:37,506 --> 00:17:40,110
including in Brazil, with projects and programs

432
00:17:40,110 --> 00:17:42,964
to reshape a little bit the design of the Internet, etc.

433
00:17:42,964 --> 00:17:45,716
There are a lot of things going on in that sense.

434
00:17:45,716 --> 00:17:47,986
But I'm wondering, for you personally,

435
00:17:47,986 --> 00:17:49,637
what is the endgame?

436
00:17:49,637 --> 00:17:51,270
At what point will you think,

437
00:17:51,270 --> 00:17:54,462
well, actually, we've succeeded 
in moving the dial?

438
00:17:54,462 --> 00:17:56,740
GG: Well, I mean, the endgame for me as a journalist

439
00:17:56,740 --> 00:17:59,183
is very simple, which is to make sure

440
00:17:59,183 --> 00:18:01,195
that every single document that's newsworthy

441
00:18:01,195 --> 00:18:02,841
and that ought to be disclosed

442
00:18:02,841 --> 00:18:04,321
ends up being disclosed,

443
00:18:04,321 --> 00:18:06,358
and that secrets that should never
have been kept in the first place

444
00:18:06,358 --> 00:18:07,833
end up uncovered.

445
00:18:07,833 --> 00:18:09,680
To me, that's the essence of journalism

446
00:18:09,680 --> 00:18:11,207
and that's what I'm committed to doing.

447
00:18:11,207 --> 00:18:13,681
As somebody who finds mass surveillance odious

448
00:18:13,681 --> 00:18:15,868
for all the reasons I just talked about and a lot more,

449
00:18:15,868 --> 00:18:18,394
I mean, I look at this as work that will never end

450
00:18:18,394 --> 00:18:20,571
until governments around the world

451
00:18:20,571 --> 00:18:23,190
are no longer able to subject entire populations

452
00:18:23,190 --> 00:18:24,676
to monitoring and surveillance

453
00:18:24,676 --> 00:18:27,265
unless they convince some court or some entity

454
00:18:27,265 --> 00:18:28,987
that the person they've targeted

455
00:18:28,987 --> 00:18:31,578
has actually done something wrong.

456
00:18:31,578 --> 00:18:34,813
To me, that's the way that
privacy can be rejuvenated.

457
00:18:34,813 --> 00:18:37,159
BG: So Snowden is very,
as we've seen at TED,

458
00:18:37,159 --> 00:18:39,927
is very articulate in presenting and portraying himself

459
00:18:39,927 --> 00:18:42,207
as a defender of democratic values

460
00:18:42,207 --> 00:18:43,920
and democratic principles.

461
00:18:43,920 --> 00:18:46,948
But then, many people really 
find it difficult to believe

462
00:18:46,948 --> 00:18:49,350
that those are his only motivations.

463
00:18:49,350 --> 00:18:50,828
They find it difficult to believe

464
00:18:50,828 --> 00:18:52,449
that there was no money involved,

465
00:18:52,449 --> 00:18:54,360
that he didn't sell some of those secrets,

466
00:18:54,360 --> 00:18:56,189
even to China and to Russia,

467
00:18:56,189 --> 00:18:58,733
which are clearly not the best friends

468
00:18:58,733 --> 00:19:00,902
of the United States right now.

469
00:19:00,902 --> 00:19:02,608
And I'm sure many people in the room

470
00:19:02,608 --> 00:19:04,878
are wondering the same question.

471
00:19:04,878 --> 00:19:06,761
Do you consider it possible there is

472
00:19:06,761 --> 00:19:09,373
that part of Snowden we've not seen yet?

473
00:19:09,373 --> 00:19:12,554
GG: No, I consider that absurd and idiotic.

474
00:19:12,554 --> 00:19:14,968
(Laughter) If you wanted to,

475
00:19:14,968 --> 00:19:17,430
and I know you're just playing devil's advocate,

476
00:19:17,430 --> 00:19:20,641
but if you wanted to sell

477
00:19:20,641 --> 00:19:22,547
secrets to another country,

478
00:19:22,547 --> 00:19:24,264
which he could have done and become

479
00:19:24,264 --> 00:19:25,910
extremely rich doing so,

480
00:19:25,910 --> 00:19:27,891
the last thing you would 
do is take those secrets

481
00:19:27,891 --> 00:19:30,635
and give them to journalists and
ask journalists to publish them,

482
00:19:30,635 --> 00:19:32,661
because it makes those secrets worthless.

483
00:19:32,661 --> 00:19:34,309
People who want to enrich themselves

484
00:19:34,309 --> 00:19:36,279
do it secretly by selling 
secrets to the government,

485
00:19:36,279 --> 00:19:38,100
but I think there's one important point worth making,

486
00:19:38,100 --> 00:19:40,338
which is, that accusation comes from

487
00:19:40,338 --> 00:19:42,170
people in the U.S. government,

488
00:19:42,170 --> 00:19:44,190
from people in the media who are loyalists

489
00:19:44,190 --> 00:19:45,788
to these various governments,

490
00:19:45,788 --> 00:19:48,936
and I think a lot of times when people make accusations like that about other people —

491
00:19:48,936 --> 00:19:50,541
"Oh, he can't really be doing this

492
00:19:50,541 --> 00:19:52,206
for principled reasons,

493
00:19:52,206 --> 00:19:54,448
he must have some corrupt, nefarious reason" —

494
00:19:54,448 --> 00:19:56,555
they're saying a lot more about themselves

495
00:19:56,555 --> 00:19:58,381
than they are the target of their accusations,

496
00:19:58,381 --> 00:20:02,766
because — (Applause) —

497
00:20:02,766 --> 00:20:05,286
those people, the ones who make that accusation,

498
00:20:05,286 --> 00:20:07,190
they themselves never act

499
00:20:07,190 --> 00:20:09,112
for any reason other than corrupt reasons,

500
00:20:09,112 --> 00:20:10,744
so they assume

501
00:20:10,744 --> 00:20:13,376
that everybody else is plagued by the same disease

502
00:20:13,376 --> 00:20:15,378
of soullessness as they are,

503
00:20:15,378 --> 00:20:17,249
and so that's the assumption.

504
00:20:17,249 --> 00:20:18,876
(Applause)

505
00:20:18,876 --> 00:20:21,360
BG: Glenn, thank you very much.
GG: Thank you very much.

506
00:20:21,360 --> 00:20:23,692
BG: Glenn Greenwald.

507
00:20:23,692 --> 00:20:24,806
(Applause)