Welcome to the Empire Files podcast. This is your host, Abby Martin. This is the audio of our show.

You can watch the episodes on our YouTube channel or at the Empirefiles.tv.

Today, the mass surveillance of all Americans by the U.S. government and its corporate partners

is a totally normalized reality. Despite its widespread acceptance, it is an outrageous,

blatant violation of our constitutional rights. It's difficult to ascertain how the chilling

effect of Dragnet spying has changed society in the post-9-11 world. However, many insiders in the intelligence community understood the dangers of these programs from the beginning.

Edward Snowden is celebrated as a hero for bringing proof of NSA's mass spying and bulk collection to the world.

But years prior, Bill Binney had blown the whistle on this very same program.

A 36-year veteran at the NSA, Bill Binney was blown the whistle on this very same program. A 36-year veteran at the NSA,

Bill Binney was the technical director,

responsible for developing and overseeing the agency's spying technology.

He even developed Thinthread,

the data monitoring program that was later hijacked by the Bush administration

to implement widespread warrantless

surveillance.

Mounting pressure caused Obama to pass the Freedom Act in 2015, which only outsourced its bulk

acquisition to telecom companies, using the secret of FISA court as an intermediary.

In nearly 20 years after 9-11, these unaccountable agencies are using new fears, like of Russian

cyber warfare, to grow their power in operations. I caught up with Binnie in Vancouver at the

University of British Columbia, where he received the Allard Prize for International Integrity,

to talk to him about blowing the whistle and the fight against the surveillance state today.

So you were the technical director at the NSA for many, many years. Talk about what you were trying to do with the creation of thin thread.

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