The phone metadata is just a small part of the lawless behaviour of intelligence services he released proof of to journalists. For example he also released proo

The phone metadata is just a small part of the lawless behaviour of intelligence services he released proof of to journalists. For example he also released proof of industrial espionage (Petrobras), political spying during negotiations (Belgacom), of tapping internet traffic indiscriminately (Tempora), of undermining encryption standards(Bullrun), installing malware on routers, of personnel misusing selectors to target their loved ones with impunity. Perhaps you believe in your country right or wrong, but many don't nowadays, many feel little allegiance to national boundaries or national agencies which actively undermine our society. What I find most interesting here is that this attempt by security agencies to collect it all actually means that their operation can be compromised by the smallest cogs in their machine whom they foolishly gave full access to. You can be absolutely sure that if Snowden walked out with this data, Chinese, Russian and other spies have the whole trove as well dating back years, because their security around private contractors was awful - GCHQ shared all this with the US without restraint, and of course all their data is now open to the world. So the ambition to collect it all and the entire collection of data (including data on western judges, politicans etc etc) is actually highly damaging to national security, even if you believe that flimsy excuse. At some point if you're exposed to all this you might feel you have to take sides with humanity and take a stand, before these tools are used for widespread repression. At that point you start being a whistleblower, and your life will probably be destroyed by the powers that be (as his has been, or as Binney's was), because they now have that power. http://www.nytimes.com/video/opinion/100000001733041/the-program.html http://www.nytimes.com/video/opinion/100000001733041/the-pro... I think the biggest lesson from Snowden is not technical, but the simple argument that the power of state and citizen must be in balance for society to function, and we must constantly guard against the state aggrandising power, because that is in its nature.