TEDGlobal 2014
Glenn Greenwald: Why privacy matters
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Glenn Greenwald was one of the first reporters to see -- and write about -- the Edward Snowden files, with their revelations about the United States' extensive surveillance of private citizens. In this searing talk, Greenwald makes the case for why you need to care about privacy, even if you're "not doing anything you need to hide."
Glenn Greenwald - Journalist
Glenn Greenwald is the journalist who has done the most to expose and explain the Edward Snowden files. Full bio
Glenn Greenwald is the journalist who has done the most to expose and explain the Edward Snowden files. Full bio
Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.
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There is an entire genre of YouTube videos
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devoted to an experience which
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I am certain that everyone in this room has had.
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It entails an individual who,
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thinking they're alone,
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engages in some expressive behavior —
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wild singing, gyrating dancing,
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some mild sexual activity —
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only to discover that, in fact, they are not alone,
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that there is a person watching and lurking,
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the discovery of which causes them
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to immediately cease what they were doing
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in horror.
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The sense of shame and humiliation
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in their face is palpable.
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It's the sense of,
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"This is something I'm willing to do
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only if no one else is watching."
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This is the crux of the work
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on which I have been singularly focused
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for the last 16 months,
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the question of why privacy matters,
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a question that has arisen
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in the context of a global debate,
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enabled by the revelations of Edward Snowden
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that the United States and its partners,
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unbeknownst to the entire world,
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has converted the Internet,
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once heralded as an unprecedented tool
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of liberation and democratization,
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into an unprecedented zone
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of mass, indiscriminate surveillance.
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There is a very common sentiment
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that arises in this debate,
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even among people who are uncomfortable
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with mass surveillance, which says
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that there is no real harm
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that comes from this large-scale invasion
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because only people who are engaged in bad acts
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have a reason to want to hide
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and to care about their privacy.
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This worldview is implicitly grounded
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in the proposition that there are
two kinds of people in the world,
two kinds of people in the world,
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good people and bad people.
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Bad people are those who plot terrorist attacks
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or who engage in violent criminality
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and therefore have reasons to
want to hide what they're doing,
want to hide what they're doing,
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have reasons to care about their privacy.
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But by contrast, good people
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are people who go to work,
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come home, raise their children, watch television.
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They use the Internet not to plot bombing attacks
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but to read the news or exchange recipes
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or to plan their kids' Little League games,
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and those people are doing nothing wrong
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and therefore have nothing to hide
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and no reason to fear
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the government monitoring them.
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The people who are actually saying that
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are engaged in a very extreme act
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of self-deprecation.
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What they're really saying is,
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"I have agreed to make myself
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such a harmless and unthreatening
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and uninteresting person that I actually don't fear
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having the government know what it is that I'm doing."
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This mindset has found what I think
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is its purest expression
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in a 2009 interview with
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the longtime CEO of Google, Eric Schmidt, who,
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when asked about all the different ways his company
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is causing invasions of privacy
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for hundreds of millions of people around the world,
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said this: He said,
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"If you're doing something that you don't want
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other people to know,
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maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place."
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Now, there's all kinds of things to say about
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that mentality,
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the first of which is that the people who say that,
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who say that privacy isn't really important,
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they don't actually believe it,
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and the way you know that
they don't actually believe it
they don't actually believe it
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is that while they say with their
words that privacy doesn't matter,
words that privacy doesn't matter,
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with their actions, they take all kinds of steps
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to safeguard their privacy.
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They put passwords on their email
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and their social media accounts,
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they put locks on their bedroom
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and bathroom doors,
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all steps designed to prevent other people
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from entering what they consider their private realm
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and knowing what it is that they
don't want other people to know.
don't want other people to know.
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The very same Eric Schmidt, the CEO of Google,
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ordered his employees at Google
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to cease speaking with the online
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Internet magazine CNET
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after CNET published an article
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full of personal, private information
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about Eric Schmidt,
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which it obtained exclusively
through Google searches
through Google searches
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and using other Google products. (Laughter)
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This same division can be seen
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with the CEO of Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg,
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who in an infamous interview in 2010
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pronounced that privacy is no longer
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a "social norm."
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Last year, Mark Zuckerberg and his new wife
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purchased not only their own house
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but also all four adjacent houses in Palo Alto
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for a total of 30 million dollars
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in order to ensure that they enjoyed a zone of privacy
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that prevented other people from monitoring
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what they do in their personal lives.
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Over the last 16 months, as I've
debated this issue around the world,
debated this issue around the world,
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every single time somebody has said to me,
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"I don't really worry about invasions of privacy
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because I don't have anything to hide."
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I always say the same thing to them.
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I get out a pen, I write down my email address.
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I say, "Here's my email address.
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What I want you to do when you get home
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is email me the passwords
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to all of your email accounts,
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not just the nice, respectable work one in your name,
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but all of them,
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because I want to be able to just troll through
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what it is you're doing online,
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read what I want to read and
publish whatever I find interesting.
publish whatever I find interesting.
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After all, if you're not a bad person,
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if you're doing nothing wrong,
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you should have nothing to hide."
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Not a single person has taken me up on that offer.
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I check and — (Applause)
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I check that email account religiously all the time.
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It's a very desolate place.
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And there's a reason for that,
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which is that we as human beings,
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even those of us who in words
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disclaim the importance of our own privacy,
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instinctively understand
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the profound importance of it.
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It is true that as human beings, we're social animals,
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which means we have a need for other people
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to know what we're doing and saying and thinking,
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which is why we voluntarily publish
information about ourselves online.
information about ourselves online.
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But equally essential to what it means
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to be a free and fulfilled human being
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is to have a place that we can go
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and be free of the judgmental eyes of other people.
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There's a reason why we seek that out,
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and our reason is that all of us —
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not just terrorists and criminals, all of us —
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have things to hide.
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There are all sorts of things that we do and think
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that we're willing to tell our physician
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or our lawyer or our psychologist or our spouse
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or our best friend that we would be mortified
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for the rest of the world to learn.
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We make judgments every single day
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about the kinds of things that we say and think and do
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that we're willing to have other people know,
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and the kinds of things that we say and think and do
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that we don't want anyone else to know about.
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People can very easily in words claim
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that they don't value their privacy,
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but their actions negate the authenticity of that belief.
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Now, there's a reason why privacy is so craved
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universally and instinctively.
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It isn't just a reflexive movement
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like breathing air or drinking water.
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The reason is that when we're in a state
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where we can be monitored,
where we can be watched,
where we can be watched,
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our behavior changes dramatically.
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The range of behavioral options that we consider
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when we think we're being watched
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severely reduce.
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This is just a fact of human nature
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that has been recognized in social science
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and in literature and in religion
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and in virtually every field of discipline.
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There are dozens of psychological studies
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that prove that when somebody knows
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that they might be watched,
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the behavior they engage in
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is vastly more conformist and compliant.
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Human shame is a very powerful motivator,
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as is the desire to avoid it,
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and that's the reason why people,
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when they're in a state of
being watched, make decisions
being watched, make decisions
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not that are the byproduct of their own agency
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but that are about the expectations
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that others have of them
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or the mandates of societal orthodoxy.
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This realization was exploited most powerfully
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for pragmatic ends by the 18th-
century philosopher Jeremy Bentham,
century philosopher Jeremy Bentham,
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who set out to resolve an important problem
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ushered in by the industrial age,
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where, for the first time, institutions had become
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so large and centralized
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that they were no longer able to monitor
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and therefore control each one
of their individual members,
of their individual members,
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and the solution that he devised
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was an architectural design
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originally intended to be implemented in prisons
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that he called the panopticon,
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the primary attribute of which was the construction
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of an enormous tower in the center of the institution
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where whoever controlled the institution
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could at any moment watch any of the inmates,
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although they couldn't watch all of them at all times.
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And crucial to this design
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was that the inmates could not actually
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see into the panopticon, into the tower,
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and so they never knew
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if they were being watched or even when.
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And what made him so excited about this discovery
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was that that would mean that the prisoners
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would have to assume that they were being watched
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at any given moment,
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which would be the ultimate enforcer
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for obedience and compliance.
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The 20th-century French philosopher Michel Foucault
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realized that that model could be used
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not just for prisons but for every institution
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that seeks to control human behavior:
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schools, hospitals, factories, workplaces.
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And what he said was that this mindset,
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this framework discovered by Bentham,
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was the key means of societal control
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for modern, Western societies,
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which no longer need
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the overt weapons of tyranny —
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punishing or imprisoning or killing dissidents,
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or legally compelling loyalty to a particular party —
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because mass surveillance creates
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a prison in the mind
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that is a much more subtle
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though much more effective means
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of fostering compliance with social norms
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or with social orthodoxy,
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much more effective
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than brute force could ever be.
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The most iconic work of literature about surveillance
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and privacy is the George Orwell novel "1984,"
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which we all learn in school, and
therefore it's almost become a cliche.
therefore it's almost become a cliche.
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In fact, whenever you bring it up
in a debate about surveillance,
in a debate about surveillance,
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people instantaneously dismiss it
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as inapplicable, and what they say is,
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"Oh, well in '1984,' there were
monitors in people's homes,
monitors in people's homes,
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they were being watched at every given moment,
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and that has nothing to do with
the surveillance state that we face."
the surveillance state that we face."
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That is an actual fundamental misapprehension
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of the warnings that Orwell issued in "1984."
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The warning that he was issuing
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was about a surveillance state
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not that monitored everybody at all times,
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but where people were aware that they could
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be monitored at any given moment.
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Here is how Orwell's narrator, Winston Smith,
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described the surveillance system
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that they faced:
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"There was, of course, no way of knowing
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whether you were being watched
at any given moment."
at any given moment."
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He went on to say,
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"At any rate, they could plug in your wire
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whenever they wanted to.
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You had to live, did live,
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from habit that became instinct,
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in the assumption that every sound you made
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was overheard and except in darkness
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every movement scrutinized."
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The Abrahamic religions similarly posit
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that there's an invisible, all-knowing authority
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who, because of its omniscience,
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always watches whatever you're doing,
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which means you never have a private moment,
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the ultimate enforcer
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for obedience to its dictates.
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What all of these seemingly disparate works
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recognize, the conclusion that they all reach,
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is that a society in which people
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can be monitored at all times
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is a society that breeds conformity
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and obedience and submission,
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which is why every tyrant,
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the most overt to the most subtle,
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craves that system.
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Conversely, even more importantly,
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it is a realm of privacy,
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the ability to go somewhere where we can think
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and reason and interact and speak
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without the judgmental eyes
of others being cast upon us,
of others being cast upon us,
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in which creativity and exploration
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and dissent exclusively reside,
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and that is the reason why,
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when we allow a society to exist
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in which we're subject to constant monitoring,
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we allow the essence of human freedom
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to be severely crippled.
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12:30
The last point I want to observe about this mindset,
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12:33
the idea that only people who
are doing something wrong
are doing something wrong
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12:35
have things to hide and therefore
reasons to care about privacy,
reasons to care about privacy,
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12:39
is that it entrenches two very destructive messages,
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12:43
two destructive lessons,
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the first of which is that
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12:47
the only people who care about privacy,
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the only people who will seek out privacy,
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12:51
are by definition bad people.
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12:55
This is a conclusion that we should have
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12:57
all kinds of reasons for avoiding,
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12:59
the most important of which is that when you say,
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13:02
"somebody who is doing bad things,"
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13:05
you probably mean things
like plotting a terrorist attack
like plotting a terrorist attack
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13:07
or engaging in violent criminality,
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2041
13:09
a much narrower conception
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13:12
of what people who wield power mean
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13:14
when they say, "doing bad things."
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For them, "doing bad things" typically means
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13:19
doing something that poses meaningful challenges
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13:22
to the exercise of our own power.
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13:25
The other really destructive
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13:27
and, I think, even more insidious lesson
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13:29
that comes from accepting this mindset
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13:32
is there's an implicit bargain
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13:34
that people who accept this mindset have accepted,
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13:38
and that bargain is this:
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13:39
If you're willing to render yourself
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1972
13:41
sufficiently harmless,
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13:43
sufficiently unthreatening
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13:45
to those who wield political power,
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13:47
then and only then can you be free
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13:50
of the dangers of surveillance.
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13:52
It's only those who are dissidents,
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13:55
who challenge power,
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13:56
who have something to worry about.
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13:58
There are all kinds of reasons why we
should want to avoid that lesson as well.
should want to avoid that lesson as well.
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14:02
You may be a person who, right now,
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14:04
doesn't want to engage in that behavior,
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14:06
but at some point in the future you might.
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14:08
Even if you're somebody who decides
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14:10
that you never want to,
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14:12
the fact that there are other people
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14:13
who are willing to and able to resist
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14:16
and be adversarial to those in power —
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14:18
dissidents and journalists
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14:19
and activists and a whole range of others —
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14:21
is something that brings us all collective good
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14:24
that we should want to preserve.
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14:27
Equally critical is that the measure
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14:29
of how free a society is
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14:31
is not how it treats its good,
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2150
14:33
obedient, compliant citizens,
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14:36
but how it treats its dissidents
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14:38
and those who resist orthodoxy.
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14:41
But the most important reason
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14:42
is that a system of mass surveillance
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14:45
suppresses our own freedom in all sorts of ways.
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14:47
It renders off-limits
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14:49
all kinds of behavioral choices
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2006
14:51
without our even knowing that it's happened.
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14:55
The renowned socialist activist Rosa Luxemburg
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14:57
once said, "He who does not move
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15:00
does not notice his chains."
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15:03
We can try and render the chains
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15:05
of mass surveillance invisible or undetectable,
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15:08
but the constraints that it imposes on us
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15:10
do not become any less potent.
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15:13
Thank you very much.
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15:15
(Applause)
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Thank you.
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15:17
(Applause)
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Thank you.
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15:25
(Applause)
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15:31
Bruno Giussani: Glenn, thank you.
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15:33
The case is rather convincing, I have to say,
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2289
15:35
but I want to bring you back
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15:37
to the last 16 months and to Edward Snowden
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3351
15:40
for a few questions, if you don't mind.
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15:42
The first one is personal to you.
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15:45
We have all read about the arrest of your partner,
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3041
15:48
David Miranda in London, and other difficulties,
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3310
15:51
but I assume that
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2084
15:53
in terms of personal engagement and risk,
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3356
15:57
that the pressure on you is not that easy
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1804
15:58
to take on the biggest sovereign
organizations in the world.
organizations in the world.
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16:01
Tell us a little bit about that.
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2435
16:04
Glenn Greenwald: You know, I think
one of the things that happens
one of the things that happens
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16:06
is that people's courage in this regard
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1932
16:07
gets contagious,
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1712
16:09
and so although I and the other
journalists with whom I was working
journalists with whom I was working
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3463
16:13
were certainly aware of the risk —
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1536
16:14
the United States continues to be
the most powerful country in the world
the most powerful country in the world
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2722
16:17
and doesn't appreciate it when you
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1998
16:19
disclose thousands of their secrets
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1922
16:21
on the Internet at will —
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2511
16:23
seeing somebody who is a 29-year-old
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3469
16:27
ordinary person who grew up in
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2019
16:29
a very ordinary environment
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2313
16:31
exercise the degree of principled
courage that Edward Snowden risked,
courage that Edward Snowden risked,
399
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3723
16:35
knowing that he was going to go
to prison for the rest of his life
to prison for the rest of his life
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2220
16:37
or that his life would unravel,
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1782
16:39
inspired me and inspired other journalists
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1975
16:41
and inspired, I think, people around the world,
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1823
16:43
including future whistleblowers,
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1688
16:44
to realize that they can engage
in that kind of behavior as well.
in that kind of behavior as well.
405
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3515
16:48
BG: I'm curious about your
relationship with Ed Snowden,
relationship with Ed Snowden,
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2486
16:50
because you have spoken with him a lot,
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3181
16:53
and you certainly continue doing so,
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1763
16:55
but in your book, you never call him Edward,
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2636
16:58
nor Ed, you say "Snowden." How come?
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3460
17:01
GG: You know, I'm sure that's something
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1644
17:03
for a team of psychologists to examine.
(Laughter)
(Laughter)
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17:06
I don't really know. The reason I think that,
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3589
17:10
one of the important objectives that he actually had,
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3554
17:13
one of his, I think, most important tactics,
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2336
17:16
was that he knew that one of the ways
416
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2207
17:18
to distract attention from the
substance of the revelations
substance of the revelations
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2690
17:21
would be to try and personalize the focus on him,
418
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2650
17:23
and for that reason, he stayed out of the media.
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2067
17:25
He tried not to ever have his personal life
420
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2509
17:28
subject to examination,
421
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1679
17:30
and so I think calling him Snowden
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2714
17:32
is a way of just identifying him
as this important historical actor
as this important historical actor
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3574
17:36
rather than trying to personalize him in a way
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1872
17:38
that might distract attention from the substance.
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2880
17:41
Moderator: So his revelations, your analysis,
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1457
17:42
the work of other journalists,
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1776
17:44
have really developed the debate,
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3000
17:47
and many governments, for example, have reacted,
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2128
17:49
including in Brazil, with projects and programs
430
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2604
17:52
to reshape a little bit the design of the Internet, etc.
431
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2854
17:54
There are a lot of things going on in that sense.
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2752
17:57
But I'm wondering, for you personally,
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2270
17:59
what is the endgame?
434
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1651
18:01
At what point will you think,
435
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1633
18:03
well, actually, we've succeeded
in moving the dial?
in moving the dial?
436
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3192
18:06
GG: Well, I mean, the endgame for me as a journalist
437
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2278
18:08
is very simple, which is to make sure
438
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2443
18:11
that every single document that's newsworthy
439
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2012
18:13
and that ought to be disclosed
440
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1646
18:14
ends up being disclosed,
441
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1480
18:16
and that secrets that should never
have been kept in the first place
have been kept in the first place
442
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2037
18:18
end up uncovered.
443
1086358
1475
18:19
To me, that's the essence of journalism
444
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1847
18:21
and that's what I'm committed to doing.
445
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1527
18:23
As somebody who finds mass surveillance odious
446
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2474
18:25
for all the reasons I just talked about and a lot more,
447
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2187
18:27
I mean, I look at this as work that will never end
448
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2526
18:30
until governments around the world
449
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2177
18:32
are no longer able to subject entire populations
450
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2619
18:35
to monitoring and surveillance
451
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1486
18:36
unless they convince some court or some entity
452
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2589
18:39
that the person they've targeted
453
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1722
18:40
has actually done something wrong.
454
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2591
18:43
To me, that's the way that
privacy can be rejuvenated.
privacy can be rejuvenated.
455
1111578
3235
18:46
BG: So Snowden is very,
as we've seen at TED,
as we've seen at TED,
456
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2346
18:49
is very articulate in presenting and portraying himself
457
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2768
18:51
as a defender of democratic values
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2280
18:54
and democratic principles.
459
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1713
18:55
But then, many people really
find it difficult to believe
find it difficult to believe
460
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3028
18:58
that those are his only motivations.
461
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2402
19:01
They find it difficult to believe
462
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1478
19:02
that there was no money involved,
463
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1621
19:04
that he didn't sell some of those secrets,
464
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1911
19:06
even to China and to Russia,
465
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1829
19:08
which are clearly not the best friends
466
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2544
19:10
of the United States right now.
467
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2169
19:12
And I'm sure many people in the room
468
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1706
19:14
are wondering the same question.
469
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2270
19:16
Do you consider it possible there is
470
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1883
19:18
that part of Snowden we've not seen yet?
471
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2612
19:21
GG: No, I consider that absurd and idiotic.
472
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3181
19:24
(Laughter) If you wanted to,
473
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2414
19:26
and I know you're just playing devil's advocate,
474
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2462
19:29
but if you wanted to sell
475
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3211
19:32
secrets to another country,
476
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1906
19:34
which he could have done and become
477
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1717
19:36
extremely rich doing so,
478
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1646
19:37
the last thing you would
do is take those secrets
do is take those secrets
479
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1981
19:39
and give them to journalists and
ask journalists to publish them,
ask journalists to publish them,
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2744
19:42
because it makes those secrets worthless.
481
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2026
19:44
People who want to enrich themselves
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1648
19:46
do it secretly by selling
secrets to the government,
secrets to the government,
483
1174309
1970
19:48
but I think there's one important point worth making,
484
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1821
19:50
which is, that accusation comes from
485
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2238
19:52
people in the U.S. government,
486
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1832
19:54
from people in the media who are loyalists
487
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2020
19:56
to these various governments,
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1598
19:57
and I think a lot of times when people make accusations like that about other people —
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3148
20:00
"Oh, he can't really be doing this
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1605
20:02
for principled reasons,
491
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1665
20:04
he must have some corrupt, nefarious reason" —
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2242
20:06
they're saying a lot more about themselves
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2107
20:08
than they are the target of their accusations,
494
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1826
20:10
because — (Applause) —
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4385
20:14
those people, the ones who make that accusation,
496
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2520
20:17
they themselves never act
497
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1904
20:19
for any reason other than corrupt reasons,
498
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1922
20:21
so they assume
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1632
20:22
that everybody else is plagued by the same disease
500
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2632
20:25
of soullessness as they are,
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2002
20:27
and so that's the assumption.
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20:29
(Applause)
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20:30
BG: Glenn, thank you very much.
GG: Thank you very much.
GG: Thank you very much.
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20:33
BG: Glenn Greenwald.
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2332
20:35
(Applause)
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1114
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Glenn Greenwald - JournalistGlenn Greenwald is the journalist who has done the most to expose and explain the Edward Snowden files.
Why you should listen
As one of the first journalists privy to NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden’s archives, Glenn Greenwald has a unique window into the inner workings of the NSA and Britain's GCHQ. A vocal advocate for civil liberties in the face of growing post-9/11 authoritarianism, Greenwald was a natural outlet for Snowden, who’d admired his combative writing style in Salon and elsewhere.
Since his original Guardian exposés of Snowden’s revelations, Pulitzer winner Greenwald continues to stoke public debate on surveillance and privacy both in the media, on The Intercept, and with his new book No Place to Hide -- and suggests that the there are more shocking revelations to come.
Glenn Greenwald | Speaker | TED.com