The Edward Snowden Affair (2 page)

In respect to the various classified disclosures: I had two diametrically-opposed objectives when writing about them. Though any interpretation harbors implicit bias, NSA analysts, surveillance watch groups and IT professionals may say my reading of the disclosures is too conservative. Legal experts, U.S. intelligence administrators and officials in Washington are apt to claim it is too liberal. Corporations, foreign nations and the press are the most likely to state I am close to the mark. I try to appease no particular audience, faction or party and merely attempt to present an examination of the information provided by the press through the government documents issued by Snowden. Because what is being presented is often highly technical and riddled with legal, technological and military jargon, I provide an introduction to the basic ideas and themes being discussed for readers not as acquainted with the fields as they might like. I refused to ignore any logistic warts for the sake of argumentative convenience while denying the urge to pick at others which begged to be inflamed. I save the rhetorical scratching for the Afterword. Conversely, on an equally frequent basis, I dive further into the materials than the original reports. This is not presumption on my behalf.

Though only a select few individuals and news sources were granted access to Snowden’s documents, hundreds of reports emerged from them. The journalists entrusted with the materials were consistent in presenting information in a timely manner that not only steadily progressed the public debate while frequently relating to (con)current events but exhausted the available knowledge at the time of publication. Most of the editorials, especially the early ones, had to be published at a breakneck pace and at an exact time. It is obvious in the tone and organization of the early disclosures that the journalists wanted to say more. I simply try to extend these conversations. However, like any long-term discussion, the contents of many reports overlap. Some are continuations of previous editorials that nonetheless afford new insight. In these cases I offer an overview of a program, policy or law when it is first cited and try not to betray the development of the surveillance argument. However, if a topic is introduced, but a forthcoming discussion will grant the reader a better understanding of the subject matter, I postpone inclusion until the appropriate time. An example of this is SIGADs. Though passing reference is made to Signals Intelligence Activity Designators in numerous preceding reports, in the context of the Snowden affair, their use and purpose only becomes clear in a later disclosure.

I took the liberty of presenting the international edition of Der
Spiegel
exclusives. This admittedly shifts the publication chronology slightly, but the translations nonetheless appeared before thematically related events and never disrupt the progression of discussion. I made this decision because the alternative versions are clearly intended to be the focal exposés. They are more thorough in their coverage and deliberately designed to reach a broader audience.

I preemptively apologize for any vagaries or misreadings found within my analysis of the disclosures, especially those conveyed through a foreign press. These include original editorials in German, Portuguese and French and some tertiary sources in Chinese and Russian. Though my linguistic training took place under an NSA language analyst and I possess an IT and legal background, the Snowden affair extends into many, many fields—often to an exacting degree—which are far abreast of my expertise or even competence. Though no person can be all things all the time, I cannot be faulted for lack of trying; admittedly my ambition exceeds my ability at times. Any and all mistakes have been made in oblivious good faith. For this, I ask the reader to be kind.

I have no doubt the story of the Snowden affair will continue to expand. I hope to one day see entire books devoted to the divisions of his life: Pre-June 5, his time in Hong Kong and the whistleblower in Russia. However unlikely, I am free to dream that one or more of his intelligence colleagues, such as the intern assigned to work alongside him in Switzerland, will write a memoir. Nothing would make me happier than to see enough information float to the surface to generate an extended account of the NSA leaker’s 38 days in Sheremetyevo International Airport, the Morales plane incident or the period Snowden spent with his editorial staff while ensconced in the Mira Hotel. I also hope someone will provide a thorough analysis of the Amash Amendment proceedings. Maybe a doctoral student in history or political science will choose to write about Germany or Brazil’s response to the disclosures. Intelligence aficionados pray forthcoming Snowden documents will house enough information to fashion volumes, however slim, on the various surveillance programs. And I have no doubt, there will be biographies and autobiographies about and by many of the major players in the Snowden affair, perhaps even one from the whistleblower himself. Until then, I offer this early survey as a starting point for future authors to utilize and rightfully dispute what I read, discovered and learned about the NSA, the media and the one that got away.

E
DWARD JOSEPH SNOWDEN ENTERED THE WORLD
almost 30 years to the day before it would know his name. He was born on June 21, 1983, in Elizabeth City, North Carolina, to Lon and Elizabeth Snowden. His mother has worked as Chief Deputy Clerk for Administration and Information Technology at the federal court in Baltimore since 1998, while his father is a proud, retired Coast Guard warrant officer of over 30 years who resides in Allentown, Pennsylvania.
²
His older sister, Jessica, is a research associate for the Federal Judicial Center in Washington.
³
It is assumed he has two stepsiblings.
⁴

Snowden attended Crofton Woods Elementary in Annapolis, Maryland. Then-classmate Dawn Whitmore, now a professional photographer based in Washington D.C., referred to him as “kind of sweet” but recalled that the articulate nature of his speech captured in
The Guardian
interviews was characteristic of him at an early age: “He was very well thought-out with what he was trying to say.” She added his visual trademark was his “nerdy glasses.”
⁵

He took classes at Anne Arundel Community College (AACC) in Arnold, Maryland, from 1999-2001. He did so not as a premature college student but in hopes of earning enough credits to merit a high school diploma.
⁶
His father, a stout but by no means fat man who lends the impression of stern deliberation and intense focus and who shares the same clear speech patterns as his son, reported that Edward had contracted mononucleosis
⁷
during the 1998-1999 academic year.
⁸
His illness lasted “four or five months”
⁹
and forced him out of high school as a sophomore. Rather than return to Arundel High School in Gambrills, Maryland, Snowden elected to study for the GED at AACC. Contrary to popular belief, he dropped out before receiving a diploma, which he would confirm on an online message board after having been hired to work for the CIA: “I don’t have a degree of ANY type. I don’t even have a high school diploma.”
¹⁰

There is the possibility Lon is covering up for his son because Snowden would voice harsh disdain for educational institutions throughout his life. As he remarked on an online profile page in 2001, “[ … ] the public education system turned it’s (sic) wretched, spiked back on me.”
¹¹
However, if he had been expelled from Arundel High due to disciplinary reasons, few took notice. When his former teachers were asked about Snowden’s time in the classroom, none could remember him.
¹²

In 2001, the Snowdens relocated to Ellicott City, located within the Baltimore-Washington metropolitan region. After leaving AACC, Edward moved away from his parents and into a gray clapboard-sided, family-owned condo.
¹³
Then-neighbor Joyce Kinsey remembered Snowden, who stayed in the condo only a few years. “He was a quiet guy,” she recalled, “kept to himself. He always dressed nice, was clean cut. He just reminded me of a brainiac.” She admitted Snowden “wasn’t really personable. He didn’t say much at all. He would say ‘Hi’ but he’d be looking down.”
¹⁴
Kinsey remembered her neighbor cohabitated with a roommate and then a “kind of artsy” young woman with eccentrically dyed hair whose license plates read “ARTIST.”
¹⁵
Snowden would later lament leaving this mysterious woman once he’d started his CIA training.
¹⁶

When Snowden moved out of the condo circa 2004, Elizabeth—but not Lon—took up residence. Her only roommate was her dog. Kinsey commented the canine “knows how to get her [Elizabeth] help,” perhaps implying the dog served an emotional need for Elizabeth after her divorce three years prior. Kinsey added Elizabeth’s furry companion was never out of its owner’s sight and even accompanied her to work.
¹⁷
Little else is known about Elizabeth.

Public records show Lon lived in Crofton, Maryland, from the early 1990s until 2007.
¹⁸
Whether he was dividing time between career and family or had already separated from Elizabeth is unclear.
¹⁹
Like many broken marriages involving children, it appears as if Lon and Elizabeth might have waited out their marriage until the kids were grown. What is certain is sometime after 2007, probably upon his retirement in 2009, he moved to the Lehigh Valley and married a 48-year-old woman named Karen Haberbosch.
²⁰

Interestingly, Snowden would cite having attended Catonsville Community College during this period, February to May 2002. However, the school changed its title to Community College of Baltimore County Catonsville in 1998 and has no record of a student by Snowden’s name. Ironically, negligible attendance at another name-changing educational institution followed.
²¹
Snowden purportedly enrolled in a Windows systems engineering class at the Computer Career Institute at Johns Hopkins University in Columbia, Maryland. At the supposed time of his attendance, the name of the for-profit affiliated entity was Advanced Career Technologies, but the university shut down the facility in 2012 after ending its relationship with the business three years before. The admissions office has no record of an Edward J. Snowden having ever gone to school at Johns Hopkins.
²²

The synchronicity of the two schools denying Snowden’s enrollment meant either Snowden was lying about his education in an attempt to compensate for his lack of having the minimal high school diploma, or in the midst of controversy the educational facilities were merely avoiding the limelight. It is hard to say; many of Snowden’s confidants and colleagues would repeat that he would downplay and overcompensate for his lack of formal education.
²³

With such little early information, constructing a psychological profile of young Snowden is difficult, yet it is arguable that his thin physicality, sickly nature and intelligence distanced him from people at an early age. As is often the case with such individuals, he retreated into a realm where social inadequacy was more readily accepted and tolerated. Somewhat stereotypically, he thrust himself into the world of computers, video games and Japanese popular culture.

It was during this time Snowden began appearing online. He and a group of friends tried their hand at creating a business rooted in love: Japanese comics and animation, commonly referred to as “manga” and “anime” respectively. Ryuhana Press was founded in 2001, and Snowden served as its web designer.
²⁴
Snowden’s Ryuhanan profile listed him as a 37year-old father of two, “Lashawnda and Tamiqua; Ages 11 and 12 respectively.”
²⁵
He went by the handles “Edowaado,” “Phish” and “True HOOHA.”
²⁶
His commentary reveals something about his attitude and mindset at the time. Of himself he stated, “I really am a nice guy. You see, I act arrogant and cruel because I was not hugged enough as a child.”
²⁷
Obviously Snowden’s sense of wit and sarcasm was already being used to veil his true as well as subconscious nature. But even at this formative stage, he was evidencing, however sardonically, an apprehension for authority: “I like Japanese, I like food, I like martial arts, I like ponies, I like guns, I like food, I like girls, I like my girlish figure that attracts girls, and I like my lamer friends. That’s the best biography you’ll get out of me, coppers!” Yet amid all the grandstanding, he never attempts to hide his interest in computers and technology, “I always wanted to write RPG [Role-Playing (video) Game] campaigns with my spare time, but I’ll get about three missions in and scrap the world for my next, better, powergamin’ build.”
²⁸
Snowden was already aware of his propensity to grow easily bored, even with something as complex as computer programming. He not only housed an interest in designing games but was an apt player. If the anonymous report by one of his former Ryuhana partners can be believed, Snowden reveled in the 1994 video game Tekken and was good enough to garner a crowd at the 2002 Anime USA Convention.
²⁹
Ryuhana ceased operations in 2004, but the website remained online until shortly after Snowden’s confidential government disclosures started appearing.
³⁰

Though there is no manner to confirm their authenticity, there exist hundreds of online posts under the pseudonym “The TrueHOOHA.” An account under that name on the Ars Technica message board matches Snowden’s age, and when the profile was updated five years after it was created, it listed its owner’s occupation as being a government information technology (IT) employee after having previously read “Ryuhana Press.” In a post dated August 14, 2006, the account holder relays, “I have no degree, nor even a high school diploma.”
³¹
Most would state that the capstone to the argument that the account was undeniably held by Snowden is pictures of a person who looks remarkably like him were downloaded to the site by The TrueHOOHA in 2006. However, in a world where online predation and identity theft is extremely common, especially with computer-savvy individuals such as those who would frequent a technology-themed website like Ars Technica, it is only best to assume.
³²
Yet the chronology of the posts and their content maintain a striking consistency with Snowden’s life.