Edward Snowden responds to the HPSCI report on his disclosures

Unsurprising that HPSCI's report is rifled with obvious falsehoods. The only surprise is how accidentally exonerating it is. 1/x

After three years of investigation and millions of dollars, they can present no evidence of harmful intent, foreign influence, or harm. Wow.

First, read three-time Pulitzer-winner @BartonGellman's takedown of several documented, provably false claims:https://tcf.org/content/commentary/house-intelligence-committees-terrible-horrible-bad-snowden-report/ …

An indicator of HPSCI's slant is the knowing omission of my strident, well-documented criticisms of Russian policy:https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2016-09-08/snowden-is-turning-into-a-liability-for-putin …

Despite this, they claim without evidence I'm in cahoots with Russian intel. Everyone knows this is false, but let's examine their basis:

A quote from a Russian guy who just this week claimed NATO assassinated Russia's Ambassador. Not kidding:http://www.express.co.uk/news/world/745348/russian-ambassador-ankara-turkey-nato-secret-service-putin-Frants-Klintsevich …

Moreover, Klintsevich states clearly in the audio (which NPR omits from English translation) that he's only speculating ("Ya dumayu sto...")

This is the standard of evidence the worst claims they level are based on, after three years and millions of dollars. But it goes on.

Claim: I took a trip to trip to the PRC while in Japan. Never happened -- not even transit. And USG knows this, because of passport control.

Claim: I went to a hacker conference, met Chinese hackers, then told people at NSA how great China is (seriously?). False and insane.

Moreover, I never went to any hacker con during my time in government, IIRC. Think my first was HOPE, speaking alongside Ellsberg-- in 2014!

I could go on forever. It is an endless parade of falsity so unbelievable it comes across as parody. Yet unintentionally exonerating:

They document me going, again and again -- over years, despite punishments -- to superiors to report complaints of waste, fraud, and abuse.

They characterize many of the best things I ever did -- standing up for co-workers, reporting XSS vulns in TS/SCI systems -- as wrongs.

Not one page mentions this journalism won the Pulitzer Prize for Public service, reformed our laws, and changed even the President's mind.

Yet they argue at length I should have gone to NSA's Inspector General. That he would end these abuses and protect whistleblowers.

But George Ellard, the NSA Inspector General, was just fired for retaliating against a whistleblower just like me.http://www.pogo.org/blog/2016/12/intelligence-community-landmark.html …

John Crane, who worked for DOD's IG, claims they intentionally destroyed exculpatory evidence about @Thomas_Drake1.https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/may/22/how-pentagon-punished-nsa-whistleblowers …

Bottom line: this report's core claims are made without evidence, and are often contrary to both common sense and the public record.

Was I a pain in the ass to work with? Perhaps; many technologists are. But this report establishes no worse.

Technologists are difficult because principles are binary.

Final note: HPSCI's report admits I purged and abandoned hard drives rather than risk bringing them through Russia. Glad it's settled.