Edward Joseph Snowden is an American-born and naturalized Russian former computer intelligence consultant who leaked highly classified information from the National Security Agency (NSA) in 2013 when he was an employee and subcontractor.
His illegal disclosures revealed numerous global surveillance programs, many runs by the NSA and the Five Eyes Intelligence Alliance with the cooperation of telecommunication companies and European governments, and prompted a cultural discussion about national security and individual privacy.
In early 2016, Snowden became the president of the Freedom of the Press Foundation, a San Francisco–based nonprofit organization that aims to protect journalists from hacking and government surveillance. He also has a job at an unnamed Russian IT company.
In 2017, he married Lindsay Mills. On September 17, 2019, his memoir Permanent Record was published. On September 2, 2020, a U.S. federal court ruled in United States v. Moalin that the U.S. intelligence’s mass surveillance program exposed by Snowden was illegal and possibly unconstitutional.
What languages does Edward Snowden speak?
Edward Snowden primarily speaks and is fluent in English. Edward Snowden admitted that he didn’t manage to learn Russian well, RIA Novosti reports. He spoke about this during his speech at the New Knowledge marathon. Snowden began to study the language a long time ago, as soon as he found himself in Russia, and expressed the hope that his son would help him learn to speak Russian.
At the end of his performance at the marathon, Snowden wished all Russian students and schoolchildren “good studies” in Russian.
A year ago, it became known that Edward Snowden, who ended up in Russia after fleeing the United States, wanted to get a Russian passport. Snowden himself admitted that this decision was influenced by the news that he was going to become a father.