Commondreams.org, By: John Atcheson, 08/28/2013       

Most of the debate around Manning and Snowden focuses on what they did and whether they are heroes, traitors, or something in between. And that’s exactly the way our leaders want it. Because that keeps the debate off the fact that our government is spying on us; that the fourth amendment is in shreds; that the degree of government intervention in our lives is not warranted by the nature of the threat we face; and the breakdown in the media coverage of the Patriot Act in particular, and national security in general, made these leaks essential if we are to have a functioning democracy.

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By: Realnews24, 08/21/2013

A US military judge has sentenced Army Pfc. Bradley Manning to 35 years in prison. Manning faced up to 90 years behind bars, while prosecutors sought to put the whistleblower away for a minimum of six decades. Manning will be credited with the 1,294 days he spent in pre-trial confinement plus an additional 112 days. He was also dishonorably discharged, saw his rank reduced to private from private first class and was forced to forfeit all pay and benefits. No additional fine, however, was levied against him. Manning will have to serve a third of his sentence before he is eligible for parole.

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By: RT.com, 07/15/2013

A Swedish sociology professor has nominated Edward Snowden for the Nobel Peace Prize. He says the NSA whistleblower could help “save the prize from the disrepute incurred by the hasty and ill-conceived decision” to give the 2009 award to Barack Obama.

In his letter addressed to the Norwegian Nobel Committee, Stefan Svallfors praised Snowden for his “heroic effort at great personal cost.” He stated that by revealing the existence and the scale of the US surveillance programs, Snowden showed “individuals can stand up for fundamental rights and freedoms.” 

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By: RT.com, 07/02/2013

National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden’s father has published an open letter praising his son’s contributions in exposing the United States’ vast surveillance operations. According to the Associated Press, Lonnie Snowden celebrated his son’s work "summoning the American people to confront the growing danger of tyranny." The letter was reportedly penned by the leaker’s dad and Bruce Fein, a Washington, DC-based attorney who has represented CIA whistleblower John Kiriakou.

Publishing of the open letter comes less than 24 hours after Edward Snowden issued a statement through the anti-secrecy website WikiLeaks from Moscow, where he has spent eight days so far awaiting potential asylum from one of more than a dozen countries he’s pleaded with for assistance. President Barack Obama has asked for Snowden to be extradited to the US, and the Department of Justice has indicted him on counts of espionage for disclosing state secrets involving the NSA’s clandestine surveillance programs.

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Commondreams.org, By: Lauren McCauley, 05/17/2013

One month before his January 11th suicide, web pioneer and creative commons architect Aaron Swartz completed one last project—an "opensource drop box for leaked documents along the lines of WikiLeaks." Launched Thursday, Deaddrop is the brainchild of former hacker turned Wired editor, Kevin Poulsen, who approached Swartz with the idea. Swartz built the code for the project—one last gift to journalists and whistleblowers worldwide and the open-source internet community.

"He agreed to do it," writes Poulsen, "with the understanding that the code would be open-source—licensed to allow anyone to use it freely—when we launched the system." As the Obama Administration continues their dogged pursuit and prosecution of press sources and whistleblowers like Bradley Manning and while the news of the Justice Department's seizure of Associated Press records continues to swirl, newsrooms are frantically reevaluating their security procedures.