(
boingboing via
Forbes)
Earlier this week, Xeni reported on the shutdown of Lavabit, the email provider used by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden. Ladar Levison, Lavabit's founder, has given an interview to Forbes about his reasoning for the shutdown, which comes -- apparently -- as a result of a secret NSA search-warrant complete with a gag order.
After discussing the general absurdity and creepiness of not being allowed to freely criticize the government for the order they brought to his company, he concludes by saying that he's stopped using email altogether, and "If you knew what I know about email, you might not use it either."
(more at
link)
Make sure you read the Forbes link... it has most of the article.
One of the great comments on that article:
The man is a hero. Even if shutting down the service pisses off large numbers of his users.
“There is a very small window here, for something to occur to shut down this thing.
That window is closing rapidly; you can bet that any meetings being held, are being held for “EVERY” reason other than to “engage in a national debate”, such as this charade with Apple, Google, and AT &T, all subterfuge, designed to get the people believing something will occur…
They will seek to buy time with numerous meaningless meetings, and toothless investigations, while behind the scenes they will be busy little sociopaths, burying the entire program ever deeper within society, honing their abilities, and furiously developing ways to make it all more and more invisible to everyone…
If we want to see real change occur, we need to demand that a verification process be set up, throughout the country, with offices set up in every state, staffed by individuals who are vetted and proven to have no ties of any kind with any governmental agency or subcontractor of any governmental agency…
These individuals will be equipped with state of the art audio and video recording equipment, and just like the NSA did after Snowden blew the whistle, teams of two or more individuals will record the removal and total destruction of surveillance equipment that is being used against law abiding Americans and others throughout the world…
Recordings will be made of the destruction of all private records of whomever has been subjected to such collection, and individual letters will be sent to all, attesting that all illegally held surveillance records have been destroyed, and apologizing for the invasion of privacy.
With respect to damages, which are yet to be determined, a special multi-billion dollar fund will be set up to make people whole, again, under the control of totally independent individuals or entities, subject to public verification as well…
Out of time, but essentially, what I’m proposing here is that process that, someone suggested, during the Nuclear Reduction Treaty with Russia, be employed to establish compliance, referred to as “Trust But Verify”.
At this stage in this game, No one in their right mind could possibly trust anything anyone in our government or any of its agencies does, or indicates they will do…
One last thing, the perpetrators need to be publicly charged with crimes against the American people and other Nations, arrested, tried and jailed, no exceptions…
Treat these b8stards as was done during the Nuremburg Trials… That will teach all those out there who might consider attacking our Constitution and our Bill of Rights, in the future, that there will be consequences…
I’m so bl**dy upset I can hardly think coherently…”
