Edward Snowden, Laura Poitras, Glenn Greenwald, and David Miranda propose new pact for global privacy rights
Two years after NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden‘s revelations made global headlines, a new international pact for privacy rights is being launched—the Snowden Treaty, an agreement that would “curtail mass surveillance and protect the rights of whistleblowers.”
“Protecting the right to privacy is vital not just in itself but because it is essential requirement for exercise of freedom of opinion and expression, the most fundamental pillars of democracy,” the drafters—Snowden, journalists Laura Poitras and Glenn Greenwald, and Greenwald’s partner David Miranda—explain in their proposal, which will be formally introduced at a press conference on Thursday and encourages both individual citizens and global governments to sign up.
The proposal states:
- We demand for privacy on the internet.
- We demand that the government grant us the right to privacy in our homes.
- We demand that the government protect our personal privacy online.
Launched along with the website SnowdenTreaty.org, the pact is officially titled theInternational Treaty on the Right to Privacy, Protection Against Improper Surveillance and Protection of Whistleblowers (pdf).
“Signatories to the treaty will be obliged to enact concrete changes to outlaw mass surveillance. The Treaty would also develop international protections for whistleblowers,” the pact states.
the interpretOr 