Edward Snowden - How did this man get to where he is? Not an ideal Canadidate

Edward Snowden has found himself in a pickle. But how did he manage to get to the position of having all this access to Classified Documents and working for The NSA and CIA and Booz Allen Hamilton??

Look at his history:

Born 1983

Snowden dropped out of high school and studied computers at Anne Arundel Community College in Arnold, Maryland (from 1999 to 2001, and again from 2004 to 2005), later earning a GED. Between his stints at community college, Snowden spent four months (May to September 2004) in the Army Reserves in special-forces training. According to Army sources, he did not complete any training

Snowden claims he broke his legs that is why he could not do the training. Not confirmed by the Military. I peg this as a twist of the truth by Snowden IMO

Pretty much a failure at everything. Ok he got his GED (not exactly a smart cookie, dont let the glasses and preppy boy look fool you! Paper wise this guy is a moron)

Two years after leaving Anne Arundel for the second time, Snowden landed a job with the National Security Agency as a security guard, which he somehow parlayed into an information-technology job at the Central Intelligence Agency. Snowden has said that in 2007, the CIA stationed him in Geneva, but in 2009 he left to work for private contractors, among them Dell and Booz Allen Hamilton, a tech consulting firm. With Booz Allen, he was shipped off to Japan to work as a subcontractor in an NSA office before being transferred to an office in Hawaii. After only three months with Booz Allen, Snowden would make a decision that would change his life forever.

OK so that is brief summary of his rise to being a "whistleblower"

Has the NSA and CIA now started lowering their requirements? Are they specifically looking for idiots? Do top firms like Dell and Booz Hamilton not give a crap that this guys CV was almost as worthless as if written on toilet paper?

Funny thing about his move to The Information Tech department for the CIA!! He joined the CIA as a security guard..."which he somehow turned into a IT job"??? How? HE had no Degree in the subject matter, no arrests for being a renowned hacker, no experience WHAT-SO-EVER!!! NONE.

While working at the NSA's Oahu office, Snowden began noticing government programs involving the NSA spying on American citizens via phone calls and internet use. Before long, leaving his "very comfortable life" and $200,000 salary behind, in May 2013, Snowden began copying top-secret NSA documents while at work, building a dossier on practices that he found invasive and disturbing. The documents contained vast and damning information on the NSA's domestic surveillance practices, including spying on millions of American citizens under the umbrella of programs such as PRISM.

After he had compiled a large store of documents, Snowden told his NSA supervisor that he needed a leave of absence to undergo treatment for epilepsy, a condition recently diagnosed. He also told his girlfriend that he'd be leaving Hawaii for a few weeks, remaining vague about why.

But this "security guard / IT novice" is given access to highly classified information??? Where are his credentials for obtaining this kind of job. He is being paid $200,000???

None of this adds up at all! It just doesn't make sense!

This nobody gets a decent job with two Intelligence agencies as a contractor and can walk out the door after spending time building a dossier of files!! All this accomplished with the education of a high schooler!!


Can people on ATS explain this? Debate this? Offer a reason as too how this happened? Or does it sound like BS?

originally posted by: projectbane


Pretty much a failure at everything. Ok he got his GED (not exactly a smart cookie, dont let the glasses and preppy boy look fool you! Paper wise this guy is a moron)

That statement makes no sense at all...getting your GED doesnt mean you are smart or not smart. Obviously the guy did a lot of self teaching. I have a Bachelors degree in science and I made the Dean's List multiple times...I can tell you that college was a joke besides the expensive lab equipment I got to work with....Intelligent people can teach themselves usually much better than being in a classroom setting.

originally posted by: cosmicexplorer

originally posted by: projectbane


Pretty much a failure at everything. Ok he got his GED (not exactly a smart cookie, dont let the glasses and preppy boy look fool you! Paper wise this guy is a moron)

That statement makes no sense at all...getting your GED doesnt mean you are smart or not smart. Obviously the guy did a lot of self teaching. I have a Bachelors degree in science and I made the Dean's List multiple times...I can tell you that college was a joke besides the expensive lab equipment I got to work with....Intelligent people can teach themselves usually much better than being in a classroom setting.

This could be a possibility. Highly doubtful though! The CIA has minimum requirements and barely completing a basic GED and attending a community college doesn't stand out in the crowd. Many applicants a year are turned away for not meeting basic education requirements.

Snowden took just a few computer classes at a community college in a bid to get his high-school equivalency degree, yet he failed to complete them.

Hiring screeners at Booz Allen Hamilton found possible discrepancies in a resume submitted by Edward Snowden, but the company still employed him, a source with detailed knowledge of the matter told Reuters.

Having a piece of paper does not equate to being highly intelligent .Take a look around at all the morons that the US public hold in high degree and who have the paper work to show you .(Kerry) comes to mind along with Bush

People with extreme intelligence often range from eccentric to full blown insanity and as such their academic record can be misleading. Not sure if that is the case with Snowden but I wouldn't gauge his intelligence by his official record and his results from standardized testing.

Since when is a paper of your qualifications an accurate representation of yourself? What's on your CV could just as well be worthless experiences giving an employer a false sense of security regarding your accomplishments that in reality have no practical use. In many cases I think CV's are greatly exaggerated to make you look good and not representing truth of your ability. The CV, a paper that summerize an extremely small part of your being has been given an extraordinary amount of importance despite being such an inadequate tool of representation.

Being an academic failure doesn't automatically translate to being unable to accomplish anything, as cosmicexplorer said in an above post a classroom setting doesn't suit everyone, and given that you have enough interest in something you can learn it by yourself, how do you think learning started in the first place? Of course it will be beneficial to your learning if you consult a master of whatever you are trying to learn, you might just need a hint here and there and preferably in a one-on-one session. The larger the classes are the more people tend to divide their attention and the responsibility of actually receiving and remembering the information.

On the other hand in some cases everything I just said might be reversed except a paper is still a poor piece of representation, but at the very least it'll the employer an idea who you are.

a reply to: projectbane

But how did he manage to get to the position of having all this access to Classified Documents…

All he had to do was sit down and hit "enter".

That was his whole point, I thought?

Doesn't take a genius to do what he did, just a conscience.

a reply to: projectbane

Pretty much down on the boy, huh?
Do you know how many billionaires these days dropped out of college?
Some would say that is a mark of intelligence when their later accomplishments showed that to be true.
You think he simply sent the Army a note say, "Sorry, I can't come anymore I broke my leg?"
You want he should have been a rich family-financed Ivy Leaguer?

It would seem from our point of view that he had some personal indignity that was not purchased at Harvard, MIT, etc. I'm not sure from your post that you can understand that. But perhaps what you can understand is that he is as many of us are, nothing more than a victim of circumstance after a certain point. Now if he had attempted to sell his purloined data to the Russkies or the Chinese then we could think badly about him without a doubt, but when he brings to the WORLD'S attention a great injustice to what most of us consider personal freedom, then maybe such a view has another think coming.

originally posted by: the2ofusr1
Having a piece of paper does not equate to being highly intelligent .Take a look around at all the morons that the US public hold in high degree and who have the paper work to show you .(Kerry) comes to mind along with Bush

Your line of thinking is really just nonsense. Unless Snowden was working on some super crazy stuff in his private life that the CIA sniffed out and approached him about, he never would have gotten a job doing what he did. It's the only viable solution to how he could have landed a job there in tech. Other than that, he would never have seen the front door. I made the case the OP made, when this all hit. I got the same responses you posted. It's garbage. Unless he was some super hacker that they caught up to, he was just some dopey kid with a GED and his resume would have been tossed in the trash.

a reply to: Bilk22 Well it's hard to say what talents he had but it seems that he got the goods on the NSA and opened a big can of worms .Sometimes luck can play a bigger factor on success then sheer ability .He doesn't seem to be a dummy but maybe I am not smart enough to see it .

originally posted by: Aliensun
a reply to: projectbane

Pretty much down on the boy, huh?
Do you know how many billionaires these days dropped out of college?
Some would say that is a mark of intelligence when their later accomplishments showed that to be true.
You think he simply sent the Army a note say, "Sorry, I can't come anymore I broke my leg?"
You want he should have been a rich family-financed Ivy Leaguer?

It would seem from our point of view that he had some personal indignity that was not purchased at Harvard, MIT, etc. I'm not sure from your post that you can understand that. But perhaps what you can understand is that he is as many of us are, nothing more than a victim of circumstance after a certain point. Now if he had attempted to sell his purloined data to the Russkies or the Chinese then we could think badly about him without a doubt, but when he brings to the WORLD'S attention a great injustice to what most of us consider personal freedom, then maybe such a view has another think coming.

Your argument doesn't hold water. Those dropout billionaires started their own companies. They didn't get hired into top spots by submitting a resume with nothing on it. The only part of your post I agree with is that an academic record does not make the person. But the lack of one does not get you hired into top positions within the government or private sector without some unusual circumstances like the guy was caught hacking into very secure government servers and exhibited genius they believed they could use. Short of that, he was basically a GED holder with nothing to offer.

originally posted by: the2ofusr1
a reply to: Bilk22 Well it's hard to say what talents he had but it seems that he got the goods on the NSA and opened a big can of worms .Sometimes luck can play a bigger factor on success then sheer ability .He doesn't seem to be a dummy but maybe I am not smart enough to see it .

No he doesn't appear to be a dummy. He is well spoken and exhibits an elevated level of intellect. The part of the "story" that doesn't fit is how he got to the positions he was entrusted with based on his record. That's where the whole thing smells.

He doesn't have to be anyone special, or a genius. He has a conscience, unlike many. That conscience was what made him act. He knew how unacceptable what was happening really was. Here is a quote from someone who doesn't seem to have a conscience:

In 2007, then-Senator Obama criticized the Bush administration for monitoring Americans who had done nothing wrong:

“This administration also puts forward a false choice between the liberties we cherish and the security we provide. I will provide our intelligence and law enforcement agencies with the tools they need to track and take out the terrorists without undermining our Constitution and our freedom. That means no more illegal wiretapping of American citizens. No more national security letters to spy on citizens who are not suspected of a crime. No more tracking citizens who do nothing more than protest a misguided war. No more ignoring the law when it is inconvenient. That is not who we are. And it is not what is necessary to defeat the terrorists. The FISA court works. The separation of powers works. Our Constitution works. We will again set an example for the world that the law is not subject to the whims of stubborn rulers, and that justice is not arbitrary.”

LOL.

a reply to: intrptr

I don't think the NSA gives someone a 200k salary or the dream posting of Hawaii for their ability to push enter. It doesn't diminish what he exposed but his resume looks like that of someone who foreign agencies would see as a potential recruit. An American who they know is smart but with no focus and perhaps he was given that training and focus by someone who knew what the NSA was looking for, knew his potential and were more disciplined in making sure he reached that potential than anyone previously had been.

This is purely speculation. They might identify potential candidates by dropping a puzzle into a regular test that few people can solve. These puzzles would probably take a few minutes if you are smart enough but if you aren't you would be lucky to get the correct answer using a pen and pad in an hour. There would be an obvious answer that is incorrect and the average person doesn't go beyond that.

If the Russians knew the results of these tests or planted them themselves in standard tests they would know who had the skills they were looking for and those who only needed to be instilled with focus and discipline. The following is fiction but maybe something similar to this exists.

alias.wikia.com...

I think a few on here are missing the point. By a long way.

Yes many people with NO qualifications have exceeded all expectation and formed companies in the fortune 500.
These people did this from the ground up and excelled.

HOWEVER, when applying to join an agency like the cia OR nsa or even a top consulting firm your first impression is your resume. He has nothing on his. NOTHING. he wouldn't get in the door!! Let alone get the job.

Booz Allen HAmilton firm even questioned his "misrepresented" CV. He had nothing of note and no apt qualifications to present.

He should not of even been selected for interview!! It would not happen!! That is my threads point!!

If anyone has ever tried to get a prestigious job, competition is immense and so is screening before interview.

To me it doesnt add up!!!

a reply to: projectbane

The most obvious answer is the NSA has their own testing methods that are classified and independent of a persons results elsewhere.

a reply to: Bilk22 His public personality is attractive and his academic portfolio none threatening to security .Dumb house luck or bad luck .I was surprised he asked Putin questions in the same vein as nsa . this is his latest piece sense then www.informationclearinghouse.info...

A useful idiot is all he is

His history reads like a wannabe spy /special forces flop/weirdo without any credible evidence to back up or warrant his job position or posting.. He does not have the background or history to prove he is anyone other than a wannabe, and of course a bit of an attention seeker,

However he is a very useful idiot for Russia China et el even of he was a receptionist he is still useful for propaganda purposes if he's willing to sell out his own country for fame and fortune

I don't understand how people can say you can self teach the qualifications needed for these jobs positions, and you do t need certificates and qualifications proof, if that's the case then I guess we can all fly helicopters and get the jobs we want

The Snowdon story has always stunk of Intelligence leak & anti west propaganda campaign under the guise of whistle blower

originally posted by: projectbane
I think a few on here are missing the point. By a long way.

Yes many people with NO qualifications have exceeded all expectation and formed companies in the fortune 500.
These people did this from the ground up and excelled.

HOWEVER, when applying to join an agency like the cia OR nsa or even a top consulting firm your first impression is your resume. He has nothing on his. NOTHING. he wouldn't get in the door!! Let alone get the job.

Booz Allen HAmilton firm even questioned his "misrepresented" CV. He had nothing of note and no apt qualifications to present.

He should not of even been selected for interview!! It would not happen!! That is my threads point!!

If anyone has ever tried to get a prestigious job, competition is immense and so is screening before interview.

To me it doesnt add up!!!

Yes all true and why I have always suspected Snowden is a fictional character, brought to you by your favorite letter agency. Think about it. He has no HS diploma and no college degree, so no way to look into his past. Most people he encountered, probably forgot they ever met him if his stints in school were short-lived.

My belief has always been, his roll was to implant within the global consciousness, that Big Brother sees and hears everything. This accomplishes multiple objectives. It draws out people. It causes them to make posts on the internet which reveal theirs their thinking, their politics and any future motivations they may have. For those that are considered a threat to TPTB, it causes them to change their patterns of exchange, pushing them to more remote parts of the net, corralled in a sense, where they can be more easily managed. It also sends a message to various governments across the globe that they too are being watched.

Why use a guy with a GED and no special or illustrious degrees? Because he could be anyone. He's easily identified with and just some Joe and not a privileged 1%er from an Ivy League school. He's a modern day Paul Revere shining the light on the evil empire, so he will draw common people in like bugs to a light.

Is China and Putin in on it? Sure. Think about it. He went to the two countries most associated with suppressing information and freedom os speech. How ironic. Those two countries are in league with this as they too try to keep the lids on their own people and hold onto the power they wield over their own populations. This was to serve all three powers. I think Michael Hastings discovered this and why he was terminated. They didn't off Greenwald. Why? He's been the one disseminating the information. Hastings probably put the pieces to the puzzle together and was ready to expose it.

originally posted by: cosmicexplorer

originally posted by: projectbane


Pretty much a failure at everything. Ok he got his GED (not exactly a smart cookie, dont let the glasses and preppy boy look fool you! Paper wise this guy is a moron)

That statement makes no sense at all...getting your GED doesnt mean you are smart or not smart. Obviously the guy did a lot of self teaching. I have a Bachelors degree in science and I made the Dean's List multiple times...I can tell you that college was a joke besides the expensive lab equipment I got to work with....Intelligent people can teach themselves usually much better than being in a classroom setting.

Very much in agreement. And also this 'moron' gets a plumb job in Geneva too, funny that?
I have heard Snowden speaking in conference, and he comes across in Q & A as a highly intelligent 'moron'.
Now, if ever Snowden returned to the West I would personally shake his hand and thank him for what he did, and feck the CIA/NSA/DHS/FBI/NCTC..... As far as I can see the only moron/s around are those who would attempt a character assassination as bad as this.