Thats not just Data Collection; thats digital surveillance. I argued it was unethical, illegal and unconstitutional, and when this comes out, all hell is gonna break loose. Narrator next on frontline, United States of secrets. Part one the program. Frontlinis made possible by contributions to your pbs station from and by the corporation for public broadcasting. Major support for frontliis provided by the john d. And catherine t. Macarthur foundation, committed to building a more just, verdant and peaceful world. More information is available at macfound. Org. Additional funding is provided by the park foundation, dedicated to heightening Public Awareness of critical issues. The wyncote foundation. And by the frontline journalism fund, with major support from john and Jo Ann Hagler and a grant from millicent bell, through the millicent and eugene bell foundation. Narrator the biggest leak of government secrets ever began in december of 2012 with a single email delivered to an ip address in rio de janeiro. Glenn greenwald, one of the worlds busiest journalists, is sitting in his home in rio, and he sees an email from someone he doesnt know its not a friend, its not his mom and it just says, ive got some stuff you might be interested in. He didnt use his name, and he said very cryptically and very vaguely that he had information that he wanted to discuss with me, but could only do so if i were to install encryption. Narrator Guardian Newspaper columnist and blogger Glenn Greenwald didnt pay much attention to the email. 99 of the time, it ends up that theyre crazy or delusional, or the story is just not very good. And this guy or girl we dont know who it is is persistent, so a few days later emails again and says, look, glenn, can you do this thing . And glenn still doesnt do it. This attempt, basically, to leak all of these secrets initially just goes straight into the sand. Narrator the source moved on, this time to berlin. He was soon exchanging emails with american documentary filmmaker Laura Poitras. She had been in contact for over a month with a mysterious source who had reached out to her using her encryption key and using anonymous channels, and said he had a big story for her. Narrator a few weeks later in new york, poitras met National SecurityInvestigative ReporterBarton Gellman at a Greenwich Village restaurant. This was something she wanted to be exceptioionally careful about. We agreed on a cafe to meet at. We also, i think, both understood that when we got there, wed move to someplace else. Narrator poitras asked gellman to vet the source and meet him electronically. Her source, who became also my source, needed to take very special precautions in the usual nsa style. And so he called me brass banner. And he called himself verax, which means truth teller in latin. Narrator through sophisticated encrypted messages, verax promised an unprecedented scoop. But it came with a warning. He believed he was risking his freedom and possibly his life. And he warned me as well that if the u. S. Intelligence community believed that by getting rid of me they could prevent the story from happening, he said that my life would be at risk. Narrator in late may, verax surprised gellman and poitras. He sent them an invitation. He said, your destination is hong kong. Narrator poitras wanted to go. Barton gellman, worried about a secret meeting in a foreign country like china, decided not to. But poitras knew someone who might join her. That spring, Glenn Greenwald arrived in new york to deliver a speech. And we met that night in my hotel, in the lobby. And she showed me these emails that she had been exchanging with this person who was claiming that he was a National Security state insider with access to very Sensitive Information that he believed to be very incriminating, and stated very definitively that he wanted to turn it over to her and to me. Narrator greenwald decided to join poitras. We all knew that this was incredibly risky and uncertain, but the story had to be reported. Narrator in june, poitras and greenwald headed to the airport. I think theyre kind of quite excited, but theres also a sort of feeling that maybe this is just the most terrific hoax. Narrator they were joined by Ewen Macaskill, a veteran guardian reporter. At the time, i didnt think it was for real, didnt take it that seriously, and thought it was a slightly obscure story. Narrator once they were finally airborne, poitras thought it was safe to share with greenwald something the source had securely sent to her. And thats kind of quite a moment. Theyre in a secure space, and so laura creeps forward to go and see glenn. Laura whips out this thumb drive and in a very sort of almost mischievous way says, you know, guess what this is . And told me that she had just received a fairly large archive of documents. They kind of cant control their excitement because this is clearly the biggest story that anyone has worked on since the pentagon papers in the 1970s. I didnt sleep one second for the next 16 hours because the adrenaline made that impossible to do, because i not only saw the magnitude of the documents, just the sheer quantity. The fact that we had in our possession thousands, not dozens or hundreds, but many thousands of top secret nsa documents that were about a wide range of surveillance activities, that came directly from some of the most sensitive areas of the agency. I could see out of the corner of my eye glenn with the light on throughout this 13hour flight reading on his laptop all the time, laura coming to see him, them having chats, and glenn getting more and more excited. We essentially couldnt believe what it was that we had. And that was really the first time i think i fully understood that this was going to be unlike any other story, really ever, in american journalism or politics. Narrator in hong kong, greenwald and the others traveled to a hotel in kowloon. Snowdens instructions to glenn and laura are like a kind of Magical Mystery Tour crossed with something out of john lecarre. He tells them to go to a hotel, the mira hotel in hong kong, and says that he will meet them in a lesstrafficked part of the hotel, next to a shopping mall, by a bench and a crocodile. We had still no idea of who he was, what his age was, what his race was. We knew nothing about him demographically at all. And so the plan that he picked was that he would be holding a rubiks cube in his hand so that when he entered the room, we would immediately know who he was. All of a sudden, this guy comes past with a rubiks cube scrambled up, which was part of the code but the man before them is not what theyd expected. Theyd expected some grizzled cia veteran wearing a blue blazer, maybe with a bit of dandruff, with a tie, receding grey hair. And they get this callow, sort of thinlimbed student type who looks as if hes just out of high school. And he is their source. And hes supposedly the guy who has got the crown jewels. When this 29yearold kid who looks a lot younger shows up, it was extremely disorienting and introduced a real awkwardness to our interaction, and kind of a shock. Narrator Edward Snowden led the group upstairs to his room. In his bedroom by the door, hed piled pillows as high up the door jambs as he could, and pillows along the bottom. So if somebody was outside eavesdropping, it would make it harder for them. There was always this kind of uncertainty, one might even say danger, hovering over the room, especially for the first few days, because we didnt know what the nsa knew about what he was doing. So we thought it was very possible that the door could be barged down at any moment and someone could enter to arrest snowden. Narrator they painstakingly debriefed snowden for days. At one point, guardian reporter Ewen Macaskill sent a text message to his editor in new york, janine gibson. Janine knew that i liked guinness, so she said, if snowden is for real, send me a message and just say, the guinness is good. i was 100 sure that snowden and the documents were for real, and i sent a message to janine saying, the guinness is good. Narrator the documents snowden delivered revealed the history and details of one of the United States governments most closely guarded secrets. It was known as the program. The Program Began on september 11, 2001 at fort meade in maryland. Biggest story in washington now people talking about Michael Jordans comeback. Narrator the headquarters for the National Security agency. Does it look like september or what . Im in my office. I remember the day, brilliantly clear day, clear blue skies. I was in his suite, waiting for a meeting. And we had started up the hallway to his office when the first plane hit the tower. We understand that a plane has crashed. My executive assistant, a young woman, came in and said, hey, we got reports of a plane hitting the world trade center. And like 300 million other americans, i thought, wow. Small plane, sport plane, accident, too bad. That looks like a second plane. That just exploded. My poor security chief didnt even have a chance to speak. I just turned to him and said, all nonessential personnel out of here now. explosion oh my goodness, there is smoke pouring out of the pentagon. Everybody had the tv on, because the tv is where the news was. It wasnt coming out of nsas computers. It was on the tv, because we had missed the entire event. This is a live picture. We are seeing the second. It was an enormous shock that you have this huge agency set up to prevent a surprise attack, and they learn about it on a 300 Television Set tuned to cnn in the directors office. Narrator at the white house, there was chaos. A near total evacuation. Secret service bursts into the Vice President s office, basically frog marches him by one arm and the seat of his pants into this deep underground shelter that was built to withstand nuclear war. Narrator almost immediately, cheney directed his lawyer David Addington to prepare the case for the president to exercise his unilateral authority as commander in chief. David addington, principally the Vice President , was interested in ensuring that the president s Constitutional Authority was used to its fullest. Cheney says, i want you to tell me what powers were going to need, the president is going to need, that he doesnt already have to respond to this calamity. And they decide that theyre going to push every boundary they have. Addington at one point says, were going to push and push and push until some larger force makes us stop. Tours of the capitol will be cancelled indefinitely. The fbi has received 4,000 reports of bombs. Narrator on september 12 at nsa headquarters, the mood was somber. Where did it all begin . We began soul searching almost immediately. We all felt like a great wrong had been done and that we were all somewhat if not all culpable. A date that will live in infamy. You have to remember that nsa was created after world war ii to prevent another surprise attack. That was the whole raison detre for nsa pearl harbor. We dont want another pearl harbor. More people involved in the plot remain in the United States. Immediately we began to wonder what we had done wrong, why did we miss the boat, what didnt we detect that we should have detected . The Investigation Continues in this country. Narrator in the aftermath, troubling questions emerged from deep inside the agency. Had lived for at least a year. Narrator why hadnt the nsa been able to connect the dots . It was a very cautious agency. Its an agency that is fighting with one hand tied behind its back out of fear of a political backlash by being too aggressive. The president now at the door. Narrator during the Nixon Administration. A final wave. Narrator the nsa had overstepped spied on americans. Certainly appears to violate the 4th amendment to the constitution. Narrator caught and restricted by congress, the domestic spying apparatus went dark for more than 20 years. It was against the law to turn the nsa on americans. If you were an nsa analyst, this sort of legal regime was drilled into your head to the point where a lot of people said, its made the rules too restrictive and its hampered the nsas ability to detect terrorist plots. Narrator some at the agency thought the nsa had been overly cautious and believed the 9 11 attacks could have been stopped. I do believe it could have been prevented with revisions to the way we were permitted to operate before 9 11. voice breaking revisions that i tried to get the general counsel to embrace and wouldnt. And couldnt. I tried to get them to make adjustments to how we were operating, how we were permitted to operate, and they wouldnt do it. Ive felt this ever since it occurred, that over 3,000 peoples lives were lost. And its just a weight that i am having trouble bearing. Its. Im sorry, i. The toughest week for america since japan bombed pearl harbor 60 years ago. Narrator all over washington, there was a growing demand to stop the next attack. We have to remember that we had had terrorists living in this country for a number of months and we didnt know about it. What else didnt we know . And so there was a great deal of concern about the fact that we not only could not connect the dots, we could not collect the dots. Narrator at the cia, director george tenet was under pressure from the Vice President. The director had a meeting with Vice President cheney and his top aide, David Addington, and he was asked, what can be done . What can be done that isnt being done . 9 11 made necessary a shift in policies. Cheney says, in effect, to tenet, make me a shopping list. Tell me what you want to do that were not letting you do yet. Narrator tenet, whose own agency was designing covert operations against al qaeda, called general hayden. George calls me and says, mike, any more you can do . I said, george, no, not within my authorities, not within my current authorities. And he paused and said, thats not actually the question i asked you. Is there anything more you could do . I said, ill get back to you. Narrator hayden got the message. At nsa headquarters, he spread the word. Take the gloves off. Bring me an aggressive plan. And they asked me, is there anything that we had that could have prevented 9 11 . Narrator loomis told them what he believed was necessary begin monitoring foreign internet traffic going through the United States. The u. S. Internet hubs handle so much of the worldwide internet traffic. So i said, let us allow collection between u. S. Andforeign foreigntou. S. Against the terrorism problem. Narrator but others in the agency were proposing much more aggressive Data Collection. What they proposed to do is create a whole new Surveillance Program without warrants, trapping all sorts of information, taking advantage of the fact that modern communication trunk lines tend to come through the United States. The idea of this program was youre looking for unknown conspirators, and the way they devised to do that was to look at everybody. Narrator it was the outline of something hayden could take to the Vice President. He headed to washington to propose the idea. One of the worst days in american history. Narrator it would be his first meeting in the oval office. There was a massive selloff on wall street. Prior to 9 11, i dont think i knew general hayden. I probably knew his name. I doubt that the president knew his name. Its a very big change for the director of nsa to suddenly have all this attention from senior officials in the white house and so forth. And im sure it had a major impact on hayden. Narrator the president had been briefed. He put his arm around general hayden, called him his childhood nickname, mikey. So i walk in to see the president. Its the president and the Vice President in the room. Almost certainly condi was there, as the National Security advisor, andy card would have been there. Cheney suggests the question and george bush asks it what would you like to do that you cant already do that would help prevent another 9 11 . Narrator hayden outlined the program. It would gather data on the phone calls and internet traffic of hundreds of millions of americans, then search it for suspicious connections. But he was worried about whether it was legal. And the first thing he says to me is, mike, i understand your concerns. But there are some things were going to have to do, and i think i have the authority to authorize you to do things that youve outlined. The president says, go. I want you to go develop a program. Come back to me. Weve got the lawyers working on it, but you have my order. Were going to do this. Narrator hayden left the white house knowing that the program was bound to be controversial. No president had authorized it prior to this time. And Michael Hayden goes home after briefing the president and the Vice President about his ideas for expanding surveillance and takes a walk with his wife. And she said, whats on your mind . I said, well, were going to do something here. And i didnt go into any details. Were going to do something. One day, its going to be public, and when it gets public, its going to be very controversial and the people doing it are going to be swept into this thing. And she said, uhhuh. Is it the right thing to do . I said, yeah, i think so. She said, okay, well deal with that when it comes. Narrator on october 4, in a secret signing with cheney, the president officially authorized the program. That order