Permanent Record by Edward Snowden

Permanent Record

by Edward Snowden

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Memoir & Biography

What Snowden found inside American intelligence was phone, email, text and internet data collected at scale without public knowledge, and stored to be kept permanently. His memoir argues you can't understand why he exposed it without the rest: a suburban Maryland childhood spent online and a patriot's turn to intelligence work after 9/11.

Core ideas
  • Inside the system: After a brief Army enlistment he worked for the CIA and then the NSA, with postings in Japan and Hawaii.
  • The decision: He recounts choosing to blow the whistle, contacting journalists, and the exile that followed when the US revoked his passport.
  • A call for reform: The book ends with the aftermath of the disclosures and a case for changing surveillance practice and strengthening privacy protections.
Published2019
Pages339
ISBN9781250237231
ReadMar 2024

Connected to 4 other books

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