Edward Snowden pushes for global privacy treaty: Urges countries to sign up for 'Snowden treaty'

Russia-based fugitive and former U.S. spy contractor Edward Snowden has launched an international campaign on privacy rights to create a global treaty that will offer protection against improper surveillance and add security for whistleblowers.

On the eve of the annual gathering of world leaders at the United Nations, Snowden with the support of campaign group Avaaz, journalist Glenn Greenwald and his partner David Miranda launched the campaign, named as “Snowden Treaty," Reuters reported.

According to Snowden, a global treaty is essential as countries are trying to boost spying powers. Speaking from Russia via video conference; Snowden called mass spying a “global problem” requiring a global response.

“We have to have a discussion, we have to come forward with proposals to go 'how do we assert what our rights are, traditionally and digitally and ensure that we cannot just enjoy them, but we can protect them,” Snowden said.

Widening surveillance

“We see that in many countries around the world governments are aggressively pressing for more power, more authority, more surveillance rather than less,” said Snowden, citing the examples of Australia, Canada, Britain and France.

Snowden said the paradox is that the policy proposals that work against the public are being billed as public safety programs. However, he acknowledged the long haul of the campaign and said ushering in a treaty will take many years.

Snowden’s associate Miranda disclosed that a draft of a possible treaty, developed by international legal experts on Internet freedoms and surveillance, had been shared with countries, but declined to name those states.

Snowden shot into global fame in 2013 for leaking thousands of documents that carried details of extensive U.S. surveillance programs, including data of every phone call made by Americans, the Associated Press reported. He was granted asylum by Russia, despite demands by the United States that he face espionage and other charges.

Under Snowden's treaty, the countries who sign it would have to curtail surveillance of phone calls and online activities and also provide sanctuary for people who expose illegal spying.

UK surveillance

Meanwhile, some documents obtained by Snowden points to the extensive surveillance undertaken by Government Communications Head Quarters or GCHQ of the British government. The organisation mounted a mass surveillance exercise for collecting information from “every visible user on the internet.”

The Cheltenham-based agency harvested data from the users’ activity in search engines, social media, online radio, news and pornographic websites, reported The Independent.

The classified files of GCHQ reveal a secret programme called “Karma Police”. The peoples' profiles were built by scrutinizing web browsing habits of users, which included their visits to the websites of the BBC, Channel 4 News and Reuters, besides messages gleaned from chat forums and social media. The “metadata” was collected on the basis of people’s emails, texts and phone calls and revealed details of who they contacted if not what was written.

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