Quotes About Secrecy

Sono consapevole delle ritorsioni a cui mi espongo […] eppure potrò ritenermi soddisfatto nel momento in cui la commistione di leggi segrete, le grazie iniquamente distribuite e gli incontrastabili poteri esecutivi che dominano il mondo che amo verranno a galla, anche solo per un istante».

NSA has increasingly made use of a secret technology that enables it to enter and alter data in computers even if they are not connected to the Internet.

Taken in its entirety, the Snowden archive led to an ultimately simple conclusion: the US government had built a system that has as its goal the complete elimination of electronic privacy worldwide.

there are all sorts of things people do that they are eager to keep private, even though these sorts of things do not constitute doing "something wrong." Privacy is indispensable to a wide range of human activities.

La transparencia es para quienes tienen obligaciones públicas y ejercen el poder público. La privacidad es para todos los demás.

The lesson for me was clear: national security officials do not like the light. They act abusively and thuggishly only when they believe they are safe, in the dark. Secrecy is the linchpin of abuse of power, we discovered, its enabling force. Transparency is the only real antidote. *

The first was about the secret order from the FISA court compelling Verizon, one of America's largest telephone companies, to turn over to the NSA all the telephone records of all Americans.

the last story laid out the PRISM program, which I had first learned about at home in Brazil.

The third article, published that same day, disclosed a top secret presidential directive signed by President Obama in November 2012 ordering the Pentagon and related agencies to prepare for a series of aggressive offensive cyber operations around the world.

I only have one fear in doing all of this," he said, which is "that people will see these documents and shrug, that they'll say, 'we assumed this was happening and don't care.' The only thing I'm worried about is that I'll do all this to my life for nothing.

Encryption matters, and it is not just for spies and philanderers.

He had come to believe that the paper's concealment of that information may very well have changed the outcome of the 2004 election. "Hiding that story changed history," he said.

Expecting the US government to operate a massive surveillance machine in complete secrecy without falling prey to its temptations runs counter to every historical example and all available evidence about human nature.

Many of the characters named in this book existed, as did the shadowy order sometimes known as the Brotherhood of St. John of Tobolsk.

The Vatican has a reputation for secrecy and intrigue. If I have my way, that will cease. But in any large organization there are always groups who seek to have their way with power and cunning.

My friend Jeffrey Deaver, successful author of The Bone Collector and many other thrillers, confessed once that his first short story, written as a child, was a Bond-inspired spy adventure (he refused to let me read it . . . afraid, maybe, that I might try to publish it as The Bond Collector).

Secrets have power only as long as they are secret.

Don't make a story go stale by telling it to all your friends before your write it.

In pre-Watergate, pre-sexual revolution times, such stories just weren't written.

We all walk in mysteries. We are surrounded by an atmosphere about which we still know nothing at all.

Perhaps the only thing worse than having a mole is the fear of having a mole.

The easiest way to keep a secret is without help.

Someone who conceals his curiosity, is overwhelmed with information.

The gods use their chosen hard, but reveal little to them.