fund raising will enable leaders whether it's harry reid or john boehner to raise a lot of money. >> that brings us to the end of this edition, thank you for being with us, in washington, i'm ray swarez. some of america's best-kept secrets are out. by now, most of the world has heard the name edward snowden. the former national security agency contractor who released thousands of classified documents about government surveillance in one of the most significant leaks in u.s. history. he's been charged with espionage and has been living in russia under temporary asylum.

the american journalist at the er of the story lives in brazil.rican journalist at the >> we've had to come to rio to speak to glenn greenwald. he hasn't returned to the united states since he broke the story about the nsa surveillance programs for fear of being prosecuted. >> the nsa's goal really is the elimination of privacy globally.

some of america's best-kept secrets are out. by now, most of the world has heard the name edward snowden. the former national security agency contractor who released

thousands of classified documents about government surveillance in one of the most significant leaks in u.s. history. he's been charged with espionage and has been living in russia under temporary asylum. the american journalist at the center of the story lives in brazil. >> we've had to come to rio to speak to glenn greenwald. he hasn't returned to the united states since he broke the story about the nsa surveillance programs for fear of being prosecuted. >> the nsa's goal really is the elimination of privacy globally. it is literally a system designed to monitor all forms of human behavior inside the united states, which is the ultimate surveillance state.

>> last december, glenn greenwald received an email from a person who didn't identify himself. >> we still didn't know who he was, where he worked, but he was saying he had access to large amounts of very sensitive surveillance information that show the united states government was violating the law and abusing it's power. >> suddenly in my lap had dropped some of the most potent instruments for shining a light on what it is that they are doing, beyond your wildest dreams as a journalist. i had literally, physically couldn't breathe at points because of excitement and shock. >> the source was edward snowden. >> the nsa specifically targets the communications of everyone. it ingests them by default. it collects them in their system and it filters

them andagizes them and stores them. up to that point, the director -- nearly 20 u.s. intelligence agencies had been telling the public a different story. hucks of millions of americans. >> no, sir. >> it does not. >> not whitingly. there are cases where they could inadd veteran tently, perhaps, collect but not whitingly. >> after the snowden revelations he apologized saying he had given the least untruthful answer. >> i have the ability to wiretap anyone. to even the president if i had to now. >> everything from learning all your meta data, who is emailing you, where you are when you are doing it, what

your network is. so being able to target multinational corp. races around the world, fracking into the servers of the internet companies that the world is now using to communicate, facebook, and skype, and microsoft, and apple. it is all about this idea that there should be no electronic communications by and between human beings that are protected or free from the prying eyes of the nsa. >> meta data means basic records about a communication, phone numbers, when calls are places and how long they last. >> you don't have to have done anything wrong. even by a wrong call, and then they use the system to go back in time and scrutinize every decision we have ever made. >> the documents show that the nsa was listening to the phone calls. >> i think the best way to summarize the nsa surveillance is to quote

general al command who runs the agency. he had a motto, when he was in iraq in charges of surveillance against whom the united states, which was collect it all. >> what do you say to the people that are like oh, i don't do anything wrong, i don't care if they hear my calls in. >> first of all, people that say that, they don't actually believe it, they put locks on their bedroom and bathroom doors. every time someone says to me i have nothing to high, i say give me all the pass words to your facebook account, your email, no one has taken up on that, because we know that we crave privacy. and everybody in the country. and everything in the world, really. >> yeah, that was the policy at the time. >> before edward snowden, there was benny who helped develop some of the early technology being used in the collection programs.

he says 9/11 was a turning point for the agency. he left his job, and bake a whistle blower. >> with 9/11 everything changed here. and some of them said this is a gift to nsa. and what it meant is now we can just about get any kind of budget we want, and built our nsa so much larger and get more contracts and more money. and do so many more things and that's exactly what they did. >> when you have private conversations with members of the agency, what you hear is 9/11, 9/11, 9/11, 9/11, 9/11, 9/11. >> can you give the best argument how these programs work to protect americans in. >> 9/11, connect the dots. >> we need programs that connect the dots. >> but it didn't stop 9/11. >> we didn't have the programs. >> i imagine there are some people who are so flightily, and scared,

that they feel that whatever the government might do including denying them their own civil liberties is there to protect them from the boogie menh are lying underneath their bed.

on al jazeera america bed. >> in many ways, the nsa surveillance story can seem seep abstract.t request in the stream of new revelations it can be hard to grasp. sure the government is collecting information, but what does that mean for someone's life? to find out we went to meet a group of beam that know they are being spied

on. >> after 9/11 it wasn't just the nsa that increased surveillance, here at the city level, the nypd brought in two senior officials to help run a program to spy on it's own citizens. >> the program, which was uncovered be i the associated press is targeting one community. muslims. secret documents show the n cyclespd is conducting. >> this isn't a cafe, they visited mosques. >> informants record conversations using hidden like roger williams phones collecting the name and phone numbers and even photographed them. >> what were they doing? they were listening for what were people talking about, how did they react to foreign events, abroad, the revolution, or the cartoons about the prophet mohammed. what was the chatter,

what are they saying in their sermons. >> to justify this, the nypd labeled entire mosques as terrorists organizations. >> so it was total surveillance, it was suspicion, in order, it wasn't necessarily purr sighing concrete specific leads, had to do with a criminal investigation, or crime, they were really engaged in a masking effort. >> . >> everyone is a target. and every place is fair game. including this restaurant. it was listed in a secret nypd document as a location of concern. along with other bakeries in the area. all of them they say are owned by arabs or muslims. >> it is funny, because some of the nypd their

supervisors kept noticing they were going no the same restaurants, as they finally asked them, is that a real hot spot a lot of activity just turned out the cop likes the food a lot. can't blame him. the policy when it comes to muslims seems to be collected all. >> no detail of muslim public life in new york was too insignificant, or too trivial to record. and not just to record in a police report, secretly but to sort of retain it. and possibly to share it. i would love to think i'm par knowed, but they have told me i am being surveilled. it is not a question, it is a reality. so a student in the student group there, when it was being monitored by

the nypd. the police kept tabs on the website, and it did the same as other colleges in new york and beyond. may also had informants infill freight the groups. >>ly drive myself crazy if i had to ask myself this for every person i met, i don't do anything wrong, i don't say inning wrong, if they go after me there's nothingky do about that, i have two friends over there, that have known me for a long time. and it's probably only recently, not too long ago that i would have told myself yeah, it sounds so paranoid, and i would love to think i am being paranoid. >> does it make you paranoid about every text, or email? i just assume there's a third party. sometimes we will throw a

joke like ha ha, n.y.p.d., performances especially if something political. >> just to clarify for the third party, and part of me thinks we are not joking when we do that. >> this is part of brooklyn, and it is a center of life for arab they are in grocery stores and it is also a real hot spot for nypd surveillance. >> it seems like no institution is off limits. is is there any reason to believe that something here could be a terrorist group for helping kids with their home work and teaching english is terrorism, i guess so, i don't know. in organization with good

people trying to do good work, would be engaged in any kind of activity. >> so this one of the secret documents that was leaked to the press. what it does is talk about mosques and organizations and people that we know that are mentioned in here, and when i first saw it. >> it is looking at profiles and looking for the right people to infill strait particular centers or organizations. so here we are number two. there you are, huh? that's what is so like hurtful about this nypd spying is that our own community mistrusts each other. mistrusting law enforcement is one thing, be uh the fact that we with are fabric of our community is broke season is what really hurts me the most. that people can't trust each other, and you come here because it is about liberty, and justice, and freedom.

and our own community doesn't believe it. >> i remember the political discussion that i didn't want to get involved in, i remember one professor that said if he was in iraq he would be on the other side. and i remember just looking at him thinking i would be in jail if i thought that. >> they are like listen we are muslim, don't tell me about the constitution, that has nothing to do with us, what do you mean, you are america. that hurts that breaks my heart when people say that, it doesn't apply to us. of course it does, but it is hard to prove it, based on the real life experiences of people in our community. how can i stand here and say no you aren't a target, you aren't victims. they are. they absolutely are. does a constant level of anxiety that on a biological base that is can be hazardous to one's health. you begin to internalize it and sometimes if you

don't have a strong support system is in your community, begin to think negatively. about yourself, or p pas your community. the nypd declines our request for an interview. police commissioner and major michael bloomberg stood behind the programs ink cysting they don't target anyone. poms show the majority of new yorkers say treatment of muslims has been appropriate. i think the effect also ties in with whether or not they believe they search or surveillance is reasonable. and whether or not you believe invasions of privacy are reasonable, really depends upon the extent to which you believe that certain groups deserve to have their privatesy violated. theorize the others they are not me. >> we can't let this happen, if we let it to happen to muslims you better guarantee it will become broader and happen to some ore community, and we will remember and say damn, if we would

have done something, 24 would never have happened right now we aren't there yet. >> now there's some awareness socially that oh, wow, the nsa is doing this on a universal scale by everybody subpoena of that surveillance. >> the nypd admitted that surveillance of muslims never generated a lead, or trigger as terrorism investigation. >> we depend on you, >> you are one of the voices of this show. >> so join the conversation and make it your own. >> the stream. on al jazeera america and join the conversation online @ajamstream. the question of whether mass surveillance is effective in keeping people safe, is also at the heart of the debate over

the nsa's programs. and nowhere is that debate more consequential than in washington dc's halls of power. months since is thel snowden leaks and the story isn't going away yet, now congress is holding a series of public hearings today is the first one, and we are going to hear general alexandar testify. what we with accident do is spy unlawfully on americans or spy on the citizens of any country. we only spy for valid purposes as authorized by law with multiple larrys of oversite, to ensure we do not abuse our authorities. >> nsa programs have contributed to understanding and disrupting 54 terror related events, 25 in europe. 11 in asia, and five in africa, and 13 in the united states. this was no accident, this was not coincidence.

that claim was with challenge add week later. we with have heard over and over again, that terrorist plots were thwarted by section 702. that's wrong. these are not plots and they weren't all thwarted. the american people are getting left with inaccurate impression of the effectiveness of nsa programs. would you agree that the cases were not all plots would you agree with with that, yes or no? >> yes. >> okay. >> we are talking about massive massive massive collection. we are told we have to do that. to protect us, and then statistics are wrote out if they are not accurate, it doesn't have is the credibility here in the congress, doesn't help the credibility of the country. >> 2:15 and 702, are short hand for the sections of laws they use

to legally justify the collection programs. fault lines asked general alexandar to name a case where these programs play add key role. >> there are several cases that we put out. with respect to 2:15 is perhaps the best case. fbi gave that in open hearing that's a great one to use. >> okay. >> just think how do you connect the dots between the agencies and is the domestic, i think these are the best tools we need tools to stop it. >> the case in san diego is is -- >> i don't have is the specifics but it is open record, so you can pull that up. >> thank you. >> and he has just told us that he doesn't know the specifics of it. >> there has to my knowledge with with classified clearance never ever been a terrorist attack on the united states that's been foiled by use of this information, not even once.

so there's no basis for it, it just isn't any use. one thing you hear is they are creating a hay stack and inserting a needle in it. >> after the leaks as they complained the house of representatives nearly massed a bill to end the fonda that collection program. >> the amendment is not adopted. >> it was defeated but several members of congress have introduced bills to a forum or to end thele pas all together. still, the ns action enjoyed support from some powerful lawmakers. >> i listened to this program being described as a surveillance program, it is not. there is no content collecting by the nsa. there are bits of data, location, telephone numbers, that can be queried when there is

reasonable articulable sus spinning. i regret what is happening. ly do everything i can to pri vent this program from being canceled out. >> i don't have any questions, thank you. it is ironic the position that she occupied in the senate, which is chair of the senate intelligence committee, is the position that is supposed to be devoted to overseeing the intelligence community, and serving as a watchdog. and yet they have managed to install one of the most slavish devotees of all of their powers. the people that are supposed to be watching the agentsies are the ones that are their biggest supporters and the ones that try to

racialallize that gets displayed to us. >> if you are an ordinary person and you see headlines that say u.s., big brother, looking down on you, collecting telephone records etc., well, understandably people would be concerned. i would be too if i wasn't inside the government. >> crediteddics say it is too close to the office of the director of national intelligence, and accuse the administration of not being transparent enough. >> the congress has no way of verifying. they have to trust them and believe them is is whatter in telling them is the truth. >> built an intelligence

collection system that deceived the american people. time and time again the american people were told one thing about domestic surveillance in public forums. while government agencies did something else in private. as a general premise, we are pushing transparency and we will do as much as we can. there are charges that have been filed against mr. snowden. three charges. >> that the u.s. has its way, edward snowden will be tried on charges that the send him to jail for decades.

thinking any leakers think twice before coming forward. for edward snowden, it was a fate he was willing to risk. >> you are living in hawaii, in paradise, and making a ton of money, what would it take to make you leave everything behind? is. >> the greatest fear that i have regarding the outcome for america of these is that nothing will change. so from my perspective we want to have a world where there are no problems where everybody is okay and we can say thank you. so we with have is towork together to do that, and is the at least intrusive way was meta data.

if anyone has ideas how to do it better let us know. >> what price are people willing to pay for security. what can they do to the nature of society, and as promises a democracy, liberty, and privacy. while the population is less and less about what the state is doing. the state has all the power, they know everything that you do, everything that you think, everything that you fear. they know how to manipulate yaw. question have seen it happen in the past, that it was easier today than it was back then because of technological advancement. so we with have created

what edward snowden has call add turnkey to a toll tin state. the fort hooted shot l shoot err now identified. shot and kimed three people before shooting himself, and today we are learning he struggled with mental health issues. another speed bun, it is now releasing palestinian prisoners. and reports of a program to creator social unrest, funded secretly by the united states. >>