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According to his critics, Edward Snowden is responsible

for the biggest leak of American and British secret intelligence documents in history.

Mainly from America's National Security Agency, the NSA.

To others, he's a hero who has brought to public attention

the vast scaler surveillance we are all potentially under.

I'm Peter Taylor and I've been covering intelligence and security matters

for the BBC for 35 years.

I thought the chances of interviewing Edward Snowden were slim,

but it was worth trying.

It took me three months to arrange a meeting,

working through intermediaries and often using encrypted communications.

During this time, I never spoke to Edward Snowden directly.

I was finally told to go to Moscow, check into a hotel,

text my room number, and then he would come and knock on my door.

And sure enough, to my enormous relief, he did.

In this BBC WorldService program, you can hear our conversation.

My first question was, why did you do what you did?

When I was sitting at my desk at the NSA working with tools of mass surveillance every day,

I saw that the public statements of our government were inconsistent

...