Edward Snowden has become a surprise witness in the Electronic Frontier Foundation's prolonged court case of Jewel v. NSA. The suit was filed in 2008 against the NSA and other agencies, on behalf of AT&T customers. The goal is "to stop the illegal unconstitutional and ongoing dragnet surveillance of their communications and communications records."



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"Filed in 2008, Jewel v. NSA is aimed at ending the NSA’s dragnet surveillance of millions of ordinary Americans and holding accountable the government officials who illegally authorized it. Evidence in the case includes undisputed documents provided by former AT&T telecommunications technician Mark Klein showing AT&T has routed copies of Internet traffic to a secret room in San Francisco controlled by the NSA."

Included in the suit are the individuals responsible for sactioning the illegal spying program, such as "DIRNSA Keith Alexander and former Vice President Dick Cheney, Cheney’s former chief of staff David Addington, former Attorney General and White House Counsel Alberto Gonzales, and other individuals who ordered or participated in the warrantless domestic surveillance."

The Obama administration tried to dismiss the case in 2009 by claiming litigation over the matter would disclose "state secrets", therefore the wiretapping program has immunity from being part of a lawsuit. The court did dismiss the case, but in December of 2011 the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled the allegations sufficient to "proceed in district court." The "state secrets" argument used by the government was rejected by the court in July 2013, allowing the case to proceed under claims that the NSA spying program "violates the First and Fourth Amendments of the Constitution."

Three NSA whistleblowers have included declarations along with other evidence to prove the allegations of massive spying on Americans. NSA's PRISM program was confirmed by the U.S. government in 2013 after Snowden blew the lid on the whole affair six years after it's inception in 2007.

Snowden has also provided a declaration to confirm a NSA inspector general report that the case relies upon. It discussed the mass data surveillance program known as Stellar Wind. This is the document Snowden found while working as a NSA contractor. He remembers it well, as this is the document that convinced him the NSA was illegally spying on Americans, and eventually led to the infamous WikiLeaks.

Snowden declaration is important in this case because the NSA has tried to prevent the document from being admitted by using a legal technicality. Courts cases require documents used as evidence to be authenticated by whoever created them, or authenticated by someone who has knowledge of their creation. This allows the courts to use them as evidence. But the NSA has refused to authenticate the document.

The NSA claims "national security" reasons prevent them from admitting they created it. It's just a ploy to try to prevent it from being used, as the document has already been exposed to the world in 2013. Yet, without Snowden's declaration, the NSA could weasel their way out of having it admissible in court. The leaked document was never claimed as fraudulent. Instead of just acknowledging the fact that it's their document, they are playing games with the legal system by requiring the document to be authenticated by someone else before the plaintiffs can use it in court. And this is where Snowden came to the rescue, as he decalred:

"During the course of my employment by Dell and Booz Allen Hamilton, I worked at NSA facilities. I had access to NSA files and I became familiar with various NSA documents. One of the NSA documents I became familiar with is entitled ST-09-0002 Working Draft, Office of The Inspector General, National Security Agency, dated March 24, 2009. I read its contents carefully during my employment. I have a specific and strong recollection of this document because it indicated to me that the government had been conducting illegal surveillance."

The NSA pulled the same stunt with another document produced for the Net York Times who filed a Freedom of Information Act request. It was authenticated by a declaration from David McCraw, the Vice President and Deputy General Counsel of the New York Times.

EFF's Executive Director Cindy Cohn mentioned how absurd it is for the NSA to play these games:

"Everyone knows that the government engages in these surveillance techniques, since they now freely admit it. The NSA’s refusals to formally ‘authenticate’ these long-public documents is just another step in its practice of falling back on weak technicalities to prevent the public courts from ruling on whether our Constitution allows this kind of mass surveillance of hundreds of millions of nonsuspect people."

Thanks to Snowden and McCraw, the case has more legal standing to pursue the lawsuit and challenge the mass spying behavior of the NSA. These two declarations, a long with other technical experts and whistleblower declarations were file din September, with a hearing date yet to be set.

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