How Edward Snowden Helped Terrorists Succeed

In his latest book, investigative journalist and former Harvard professor Edward Jay Epstein analyses how Edward Snowden’s massive leaks regarding U.S. security enabled an entire generation of terrorists to circumvent government intelligence.

In How America Lost Its Secrets: Snowden, the Man and the Theft , which will be released this week,  Epstein explains how terrorists, whom the government was once able to track down and stop, have taken Snowden’s advice on how to evade security services. To our detriment, they have been successful.

In an excerpt from the book published by Newsweek magazine, Epstein outlines exactly how government agencies operated before Snowden’s disclosures and how they now have been left bereft of many important tools.

Specifically, Snowden exposed:

The Reach of the PRISM Program

Before Snowden’s disclosure, jihadis overseas – from Iraq to Syria, Afghanistan and Pakistan believed  their communications were safe because of encryption as well as other safeguards used by Apple, Google, Twitter and WhatsApp. What they didn’t know was their information could be intercepted before it was encrypted.  This was because all data on the internet traveled first through fiber cables in the U.S. and the Bahamas...