Is Edward Snowden The Robin Hood Of The Information Age?

Week after week, new details on the US’ extensive spying program emerge bringing with it an onslaught of backlash from not only the public but also allies.

This week’s revelations about PRISM, the Machiavellian spying program, said that the US National Security Agency (NSA) monitored telephone exchanges of 35 world leaders.  The revelation came shortly after German Chancellor Angela Merkel accused the US of tapping her phone.

The source of this information was yet another classified document provided by whistleblower Edward Snowden to the media who has emerged as a sort of Robin Hood of the information age, though unwittingly.

Snowden stole information from the NSA and brought it before a world audience. Information which the NSA had collected through phone taps and internet interceptions of political leaders, individuals and companies all over the world. By exposing the activities of the NSA, Snowden has brought global focus on the nefarious designs of a world power intent to maintain its dominance by spying on everything and everybody.

 "We need to have trust in our allies and partners, and this must now be established once again. I repeat that spying among friends is not at all acceptable against anyone, and that goes for every citizen in Germany,” Chancellor Angela Merkel said in Brussels where she arrived for an EU summit.

Merkel has found support in her EU counterparts such as Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte and Finland's Prime Minister Jyrki Katainen who echoed her sentiments and called the intrusions “unacceptable”.

The scope of American surveillance on its allies has given rise to political tension in Europe after a barrage of criticisms and remorseful phone calls with world leaders during the week.

On Wednesday, White House National Security Council spokeswoman, Caitlin Hayden, said, "The United States is not monitoring and will not monitor the communications of Chancellor Merkel. Beyond that, I'm not in a position to comment publicly on every specific alleged intelligence activity."

However, German politicians were quick to point out that her statement never denied any past surveillance operations.

Meanwhile, the source of these leaks, Edward Snowden released a statement, saying, “In the last four months, we’ve learned a lot about our government. We’ve learned that the U.S. intelligence community secretly built a system of pervasive surveillance. Today, no telephone in America makes a call without leaving a record with the NSA. Today, no internet transaction enters or leaves America without passing through the NSA’s hands. Our representatives in Congress tell us this is not surveillance. They’re wrong.”

Speaking out in support of the largest privacy rally scheduled forSaturday in Washington (Rally Against Mass Surveillance) organized by a group called Stop Watching US, Snowden added that “it’s time for the government to learn from us.”

Snowden, knowingly or unknowingly, has caused a paradigm shift with countries such as Brazil demanding that control of the Internet be vested with the United Nations.

Brazilian Pesident Dilma Rouseff's government plans to set up a Great Wall of sorts that will use underwater fibre optic cables to directly link Brazil to Europe and thus, bypass the NSA which is capable of tapping any information going to and from the US.

At present, more than 80 percent of Brazil’s online searches flow through US-based companies who have proved to be unreliable in keeping the NSA out. "Brazil intends to increase its independent internet connections with other countries," Rousseff's office said, as quoted by the Associated Press.