The Snowden Disclosures

On June 5, 2013, journalist Glenn Greenwald published the first in a series of stories based on documents provided by Edward Snowden, a 29-year-old NSA contractor. The documents revealed that the NSA had built a global surveillance infrastructure far exceeding what any public official had acknowledged. The initial revelation concerned a classified court order requiring Verizon to hand over the phone records of all its customers to the NSA on an “ongoing, daily basis.”

Within weeks, the disclosures expanded to reveal PRISM, a program through which the NSA collected data directly from the servers of nine major technology companies — Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, Apple, AOL, Skype, YouTube, and PalTalk. Additional programs included XKeyscore, which allowed analysts to search through vast databases of emails, chats, and browsing histories, and Upstream, which tapped fiber-optic cables carrying internet traffic.

The Clapper Testimony

The disclosures carried particular weight because of what had occurred three months earlier. On March 12, 2013, Senator Ron Wyden asked Director of National Intelligence James Clapper during a public Senate hearing: “Does the NSA collect any type of data at all on millions, or hundreds of millions of Americans?” Clapper replied: “No, sir. Not wittingly.” This statement was conclusively proven false by the Snowden documents. Clapper later described his answer as the “least untruthful” response he could give in an unclassified setting. He was never prosecuted for lying to Congress.

In September 2020, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled in United States v. Moalin that the NSA’s bulk phone metadata collection program was illegal and possibly unconstitutional. The court found that the program exceeded the authority granted under Section 215 of the Patriot Act and that intelligence officials who testified about it had misled the court.

The USA FREEDOM Act of 2015 officially ended bulk phone records collection, though critics noted that other collection programs continued under different legal authorities.

Section 702 and the 2024 Reauthorization

Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act — the legal basis for PRISM — was reauthorized by Congress in April 2024 after contentious debate. The reauthorized provision extends through 2026, when it faces a sunset deadline. Civil liberties organizations have documented that Section 702 continues to enable warrantless searches of Americans’ communications when those communications involve foreign targets. A 2023 FISA Court opinion revealed that the FBI had conducted over 278,000 queries of Section 702 data targeting U.S. persons in 2020 and early 2021.

Snowden’s Status

Edward Snowden was charged under the Espionage Act in June 2013. He has lived in Russia since, receiving permanent residency in 2020 and Russian citizenship in 2022. He has never returned to the United States.

Research Verdict

AssessmentCONFIRMED
ConfidenceHigh
SummaryThe NSA operated mass surveillance programs that collected communications data on millions of Americans without individual warrants
The NSA’s mass surveillance programs are confirmed by classified documents published by multiple news organizations, by judicial rulings including the Ninth Circuit’s 2020 decision, by congressional investigations, and by the government’s own subsequent legislative responses. The Director of National Intelligence’s false testimony to Congress is a matter of public record.

[1] [2] [3] [4]