HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_019500.jpg
Extracted Text (OCR)
L2 | HOW AMERICA LOST ITS SECRETS
tery I was going to solve on this first trip to Hong Kong. I needed to
know more about his activities before he got there. After all, Snowden
was not, as he himself pointed out from Moscow, an “angel descend-
ing from the heavens.” He had been working for the U.S. govern-
ment for the previous seven years. During that period, he had been
part of America’s secret intelligence regime and held a clearance for
sensitive compartmented information, or SCI. Such SCI material is
considered so sensitive that it must be handled within formal access
control systems established by the director of national intelligence.
Nor did Snowden’s breach begin with his handing over classified
documents to the Guardian reporters in Hong Kong in June 2013 or,
for that matter, in the eleven days prior to his meeting with journal-
ists. He had, as the NSA quickly determined, begun illicitly copying
documents in the summer of 2012. Such a dangerous enterprise is
not born of a sudden impulse. It was, as his actions suggested, nur-
tured over many months. Even if he had managed to elude American
intelligence from late May to early June 2013, he could not hide all
the history that led to his decision to come to Hong Kong. There
® had to be an envelope of circumstances surrounding it, including ©
Snowden’s motivation, associates, movements, finances, and activi-
ties prior to his fleeing to Hong Kong. What was missing was not
just Snowden’s first eleven days in Hong Kong but the context of
the alleged crime.
I first needed to find out who Edward Snowden was.
| | Epst_9780451494566_2p_all_r1.z.indd 12 ® 9/29/16 5:51 Pa | |
HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_019500
Extracted Information
Dates
Document Details
| Filename | HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_019500.jpg |
| File Size | 0.0 KB |
| OCR Confidence | 85.0% |
| Has Readable Text | Yes |
| Text Length | 1,678 characters |
| Indexed | 2026-02-04T16:38:27.235671 |