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So this is James Risen.
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You may know him as the
Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter
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for the New York Times.
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Long before anybody knew
Edward Snowden's name,
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Risen wrote a book in which
he famously exposed that the NSA
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was illegally wiretapping
the phone calls of Americans.
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But it's another chapter in that book
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that may have an even more lasting impact.
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In it, he describes a catastrophic
U.S. intelligence operation
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in which the CIA quite literally
handed over blueprints
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of a nuclear bomb to Iran.
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If that sounds crazy, go read it.
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It's an incredible story.
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But you know who didn't like that chapter?
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The U.S. government.
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For nearly a decade afterwards,
Risen was the subject
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of a U.S. government investigation
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in which prosecutors demanded
that he testify
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against one of his alleged sources,
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and along the way, he became the face
for the U.S. government's recent pattern
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of prosecuting whistleblowers
and spying on journalists.
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You see, under the First Amendment,
the press has the right
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to publish secret information
in the public interest,
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but it's impossible to exercise that right
if the media can't also gather that news
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and protect the identities
of the brave men and women
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who get it to them.
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So when the government came knocking,
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Risen did what many brave reporters
have done before him:
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he refused
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and said he'd rather go to jail.
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So from 2007-2015,
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Risen lived under the specter
of going to federal prison.
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That is, until just days before the trial,
when a curious thing happened.
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Suddenly, after years of claiming
it was vital to their case,
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the government dropped their demands
to Risen altogether.
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It turns out, in the age
of electronic surveillance,
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there are very few places
reporters and sources can hide,
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and instead of trying and failing
to have Risen testify,
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they could have his digital trail
testify against him instead.
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So completely in secret
and without his consent,
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prosecutors got Risen's phone records.
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They got his email records,
his financial and banking information,
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his credit reports,
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even travel records with a list
of flights he had taken.
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And it was among this information that
they used to convict Jeffrey Sterling,
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Risen's alleged source
and CIA whistleblower.
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Sadly, this is only one case of many.
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President Obama ran on a promise
to protect whistleblowers,
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and instead, his Justice Department
has prosecuted more
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than all other administrations combined.
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Now, you can see how this
could be a problem,
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especially because the government
considers so much of what it does secret.
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Since 9/11, virtually every important
story about national security
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has been the result of a whistleblower
coming to a journalist.
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So we risk seeing the press
unable to do their job
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that the First Amendment
is supposed to protect
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because of the government's
expanded ability to spy on everyone.
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But just as technology has allowed
the government
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to circumvent reporters' rights,
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the press can also use technology
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to protect their sources
even better than before,
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and they can start from the moment
they begin speaking with them,
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rather than on the witness stand
after the fact.
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Communications software now exists
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that wasn't available
when Risen was writing his book,
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and is much more surveillance-resistant
than regular emails or phone calls.
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For example, one such tool SecureDrop,
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an open-source whistleblower
submission system
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that was originally created by the late
Internet luminary Aaron Swartz,
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and is now developed
at the non-profit where I work,
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Freedom of the Press Foundation.
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Instead of sending an email,
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you go to a news organization's website,
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like this one here on the Washington Post.
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From there, you can upload a document
or send information
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much like you would
on any other contact form.
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It'll then be encrypted
and stored on a server
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that only the news organization
has access to.
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So the government can no longer
secretly demand the information,
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and much of the information
they would demand
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wouldn't be available in the first place.
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SecureDrop, though, is really
only a small part of the puzzle
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for protecting press freedom
in the 21st century.
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Unfortunately, governments
all over the world
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are constantly developing
new spying techniques
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that put us all at risk,
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and it's up to us going forward
to make sure
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that it's not just
the tech-savvy whistleblowers
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like Edward Snowden who have an avenue
for exposing wrongdoing.
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It's just as vital that we protect the
next veteran's health care whistleblower
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alerting us to overcrowded hospitals,
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or the next environmental worker
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sounding the alarm
about Flint's dirty water,
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or a Wall Street Insider
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warning us of the next financial crisis.
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After all, these tools weren't just built
to help the brave men and women
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who expose crimes,
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but are meant to protect
all of our rights under the Constitution.
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Thank you.
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(Applause)
Riaki Ponist
Hi there,
2:31
Now, you can see how this
could be a problem,
What I hear is:
I can see how this
could be a problem,
Is the change in the transcript intentional?
Thanks,
Riaki