NARRATOR: Through sophisticated encrypted messages, Verax promised an unprecedented scoop. And so he called me “Brass Banner” and he called himself “Verax,” which means truth teller in Latin. NARRATOR: Poitras asked Gellman to vet the source and meet him electronically.īARTON GELLMAN: Her source, who became also my source, needed to take very special precautions, in the usual NSA style. And we also, I think, both understood that when we got there, we’d move to someplace else. NARRATOR: A few weeks later, in New York, Poitras met national security investigative reporter Barton Gellman at a Greenwich Village restaurant.īARTON GELLMAN: This was something she wanted to be exceptionally careful about. He was soon exchanging e-mails with American documentary filmmaker Laura Poitras.īARTON GELLMAN, The Washington Post/ FRONTLINE: She had been in contact for over a month with a mysterious source who had reached out to her using her encryption key and using anonymous channels, and said he had a big story for her. NARRATOR: The source moved on, this time to Berlin. This attempt, basically, to leak all of these secrets initially just goes straight into the sand. LUKE HARDING: And this guy, or girl - we don’t know who it is - is persistent, so a few days later e-mails again and says, “Look, Glenn, can you do this thing?” And Glenn still doesn’t do it. GLENN GREENWALD: Ninety-nine percent of the time, it ends up that they’re crazy or delusional, or the story is just not very good. NARRATOR: Guardian newspaper columnist and blogger Glenn Greenwald didn’t pay much attention to the e-mail. And he said, very cryptically and very vaguely, that he had information that he wanted to discuss with me, but could only do so if I were to install encryption. GLENN GREENWALD, The Guardian, 2012-13: He didn’t use his name. And it just says, “I’ve got some stuff you might be interested in.” LUKE HARDING, Author, The Snowden Files: Glenn Greenwald, one of the world’s busiest journalists, is sitting in his home in Rio, and he sees an e-mail from someone he doesn’t know. NARRATOR: The biggest leak of government secrets ever began in December of 2012 with a single e-mail delivered to an IP address in Rio de Janeiro. Cmte., 1985-02: I argued it was unethical, illegal and unconstitutional, and when this comes out, all hell is going to break loose.ĪNNOUNCER: Tonight on FRONTLINE, United States of Secrets Part One: The Program. RON WYDEN (D), Oregon: That’s not just data collection, that’s digital surveillance.ĭIANE ROARK, Staff, House Intel. PETER BAKER: He chose to keep the programs largely intact. MARK KLEIN: He was collecting the entire Internet stream. BUSH: This is a highly classified program. MICHAEL HAYDEN, NSA Director, 1999-05: What we’re doing is lawful and I think is effective. MARK KLEIN, Former AT&T Technician, whistleblower: Designed for domestic surveillance. PETER BAKER, The New York Times: A whole new surveillance program without warrants. THOMAS DRAKE: Extraordinary means are required to deal with the threat.ĪNNOUNCER: -collecting data on American citizens-īARTON GELLMAN, The Washington Post/ FRONTLINE: You’re looking for unknown conspirators, and the way they devised to do that was to look at everybody.ĪNNOUNCER: -secrets at the highest levels of government. THOMAS DRAKE, NSA Senior Executive, 2001-08: We are under emergency conditions. NEWSCASTER: That looks like a second plane.ĪNNOUNCER: At the National Security Agency, they called it “the program.” United States of Secrets (Part One): The Program
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