Name: Edward Snowden
Job Title: Former CIA employee currently employed by defense contractor Booz Allen Hamilton.
Age: 30
Security clearance: Snowden had access to NSA documents during the last four years as an employee of various outside contractors.
Number of documents leaked: Undetermined. Snowden leaked a PowerPoint presentation and possibly among other documents about PRISM, a government computer program used for managing foreign intelligence collected from Internet and electronic service providers.
UPDATE: Word got out via The Guardian earlier this week that he also disclosed details of the XKeyscore program. The British newspaper says that XKeyscore is the NSA?s ?widest-reaching? system, giving analysts the ability to monitor millions of Internet users? emails, online chats and browsing history.
Agency betrayed: National Security Agency
Potential years: Undetermined. Snowden is still holed up in a hotel room in Hong Kong, though he said in a video that he?s prepared for the fact that he could be "rendered by the CIA" or "have people come after me" at any time.
UPDATE: The U.S. government leveled charges against Snowden of ?theft of government property, unauthorized communication of national defense information and willful communication of classified communications intelligence information to an unauthorized person,? according to Reuters. The latter two offenses violate the Espionage Act and, if tried before an American jury, Snowden could face 10 years in prison for each of those charges. However, it?s unlikely that the U.S. will get its hands on him anytime soon. After holing up in Hong Kong in the weeks following the leak, Snowden fled for Russia. He was not allowed to leave Sheremetyevo airport in Moscow until Thursday, when he was granted a year?s asylum by the Russian government. Snowden can now live and possibly work anywhere in Russia for the next year. His lawyer told Reuters that Snowden will rent an apartment and has no immediate plans to leave.
Motive: The Guardian interviewed Snowden, who lived in Hawaii with his girlfriend and had a stable, well-paying job: "I'm willing to sacrifice all of that because I can't in good conscience allow the US government to destroy privacy, internet freedom and basic liberties for people around the world with this massive surveillance machine they're secretly building."
"The government has granted itself power it is not entitled to," Snowden added. "There is no public oversight. The result is people like myself have the latitude to go further than they are allowed to." Snowden says he hopes that his efforts will spur public debate about the intelligence programs the government is running.
Name: Bradley Manning
Job title: Army Private First Class, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 10th Mountain Division
Age: 25
Security clearance: Manning "was allowed to surf massive closed databases of secret information without any restrictions as well as download classified files to CDs," according to The Guardian.
Number of documents leaked: Manning provided 700,000 documents to Wikileaks in the most extensive leak of confidential and classified material in U.S. history.
Agency betrayed: U.S. Military
Potential years: Government prosecutors are charging Manning with aiding the enemy, a charge that carries a maximum of a life sentence. Manning, who faces 22 charges altogether, is allowed to plead guilty to seven of them (not including the aiding the enemy charge), which together carry a maximum sentence of 16 years in prison.
UPDATE: Manning was found not guilty earlier this week of the most serious charge of aiding the enemy, but Judge Col. Denis R. Lind convicted him on six counts of violating the Espionage Act of 1917 and most of the other crimes he was charged with. Manning?s sentencing hearing began on Wednesday, and he now faces up to 136 years in prison. Prosecutors are pushing for the maximum sentence, a reduction in rank, forfeiture of pay, dishonorable discharge and a fine.
Motive: Manning became increasingly disillusioned with the Army and the U.S.?s tactics in Iraq and, during online chat sessions with Adrian Lamo, a former hacker, said that he wanted "people to see the truth? regardless of who they are? because without information, you cannot make informed decisions as a public."
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