As Oliver Stone's biopic about hacker and former Central Intelligence Agency employee Edward Snowden comes close to hitting the theaters, talk about controversial issues such as the government's power over its citizen's privacy starts anew.
Snowden is known for being the whistleblower who hacked, downloaded, and revealed highly classified information about the US government's one too many surveillance projects. He is currently in a temporary asylum in Moscow, Russia.
Earlier this week, one of the world's largest porn site decided to involved US president Barack Obama in its mission to reestablish their claim in Russia's internet world after being banned. According to a blog post in Foreign Policy, PornHub requested pardon for Snowden so that he can go out of Russia and stay in touch with porn.
Notwithstanding the porn site's plea, the question of whether or not Snowden's actions or for some people, crimes, should be pardoned.
CNET gives a detailed review of 'Snowden,' and expressed that first thing you're going to do after seeing the film is to cover any and all cameras within your immediate proximity. Snowden will be portrayed by '500 Days of Summer' actor, Joseph Gordon-Levitt.
The movie will feature the dramatic shift of what Snowden must have went through after changing from being a man who loved his country to being disgusted by it. It also exhibits the thin line between national security and privacy, and how the government has crossed that line in the name of the former.
In a simple show of dedication, Gordon-Levitt actually visited the real Snowden in Moscow and came back calling him "Ed" and stating that he deserves the pardon that he requested for earlier this week.
"Personally, I believe that what he did was really beneficial for the country," said Gordon-Levitt. He has become a symbol of the downsides of what technology could be, and he often speaks about how technology is misused. It was cool to hear him speak more optimistically."
In light of these events, the debate about privacy and security reignited all around the world ending with the same question: when is it, or is it ever, acceptable to impinge on the citizen's privacy? And in all this, does Edward Snowden deserve to be pardoned?
