Nude photos intercepted by NSA would be shared among employees as 'fringe benefit', says whistleblower Edward Snowden



Edward Snowden claims NSA workers saw sharing images as 'fringe benefit'

31-year-old has been living in Moscow since leaking top-secret documents

He spoke of his concerns for personal privacy and urged professionals to do more to protect themselves and the data they have



Whistleblower Edward Snowden said NSA employees saw sharing such images as a 'fringe benefit' of their position

Whistleblower Edward Snowden has claimed a culture exists within the National Security Agency in which intercepted nude photos of people in 'sexually compromising' situations would be routinely passed around among workers.

Speaking from exile in Russia, Mr Snowden said NSA employees saw sharing such images as a 'fringe benefit' of their position.

The 31-year-old former NSA worker also spoke of his concerns for personal privacy and urged professionals to do more to protect themselves and the data they have.

The former computer analyst has been living in Moscow since leaking thousands of top-secret documents about government surveillance practices in the US and beyond.

During an interview with The Guardian he said: 'I'm much happier in Russia than I would be facing an unfair trial where I can't even present a public-interest defence to a jury of my peers.'

When asked whether he witnessed anything that troubled him while working in surveillance he said: 'You've got young enlisted guys, 18 to 22 years old. They've suddenly been thrust into a position of extraordinary responsibility where they now have access to all of your private records.

'Now, in the course of their daily work they stumble across something that is completely unrelated to their work in any sort of necessary sense - for example, an intimate nude photo of someone in a sexually compromising situation, but they're extremely attractive.

'So what they do? They turn around in their chair and show their co-worker -- and their co-worker says "hey, that's great, send that to Bill down the way." And then Bill sends it to George, George sends it to Tom, and sooner or later this person's whole life has been seen by all of these other people.'

Mr Snowden said he had seen such instances on a number of times, adding: 'These are seen as the fringe benefits of surveillance positions.'

He said it was 'reasonable to assume' he was under surveillance, adding: 'Anyone in my position is surely subject to some surveillance, but you take the precautions you can, so even if you are under surveillance there's no sensitive information for you to expose.'

Mr Snowden has been living in Moscow since leaking thousands of top-secret documents about government surveillance practices in the US and beyond

A new data surveillance bill has been fast-tracked through Westminster that will give authorities greater powers to access mobile data for up to a year as part of security measures and checks.

Mr Snowden is one of several high-profile figures calling for more rights to be offered to internet users to help protect their privacy.

Earlier this year, Mr Snowden appeared on-stage via video link with Sir Tim Berners-Lee, the man credited with inventing the world wide web, to call for a 'bill of rights' to be introduced to protect global internet users.

During the talk, Sir Tim called Mr Snowden 'a hero' for the work he had done for internet privacy, which led to the exposure of wide-scale surveillance networks involving the NSA in the US and GCHQ in the UK.

However, Mr Snowden said he did not believe that technology and privacy were incompatible.

He said: 'Technology can actually increase privacy, but not if we sleepwalk into new applications of it without considering the implications of these new technologies.'

Mr Snowden also responded to claims that he was working for the Russian government. He said: 'If the government had even the tiniest shred of evidence that I was associating with the Russian government it would be on the front page of the New York Times by lunchtime.'