Snowden went too far by revealing the NSA’s MonsterMind cyber weapon

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Edward Snowden has long expressed frustration with the pace, and to a certain extent the depth, of the journalism springing from the classified NSA documents he brought to light just over a year ago. In his estimation, the abuses of power on display in those leaked documents should be splayed out before the public — and perhaps that’s why, after all this time, he’s decided to start dropping bits of information all on his own. Splitting from his original, principled stand that only experienced journalistic organizations would decide what to release and when, Snowden has told Wired about the NSA project that finally pushed him to turn on the agency: MonsterMind.
MonsterMind, according to Snowden, is an autonomous cyberwarfare software platform that can watch international connections to identify and “kill” malicious cyber attacks before they hit American infrastructure — essentially a “cyber missile defense” system tailored to provide protection against the global storm of cyber-attacks. Unlike missile defense, however, MonsterMind has the ability to “fire back” at the attacker, launching a cyber counter-attack of its own. This would presumably be done to disincentivize attacking the US — but as Snowden himself points out in the interview, these attacks can be routed through innocent third parties in totally separate parts of the world. Could Chinese hackers trick MonsterMind into “firing back” at an Iranian military installation? No matter what you think of the NSA, believe that it is competent enough to avoid a pitfall as obvious as that.

This could be the inspiration, but I doubt it.

Of all the major NSA revelations, this has to be one of the most frivolous. Certainly, Snowden has a point that international aggression should not be automated, whether physical or cyber in nature. Still, there is a discreet change in function between revealing an illegal spying programs like Optic Nerve and something like this which is, in reality, exactly what the NSA is supposed to be doing. As scary as the name “MonsterMind” sounds, cyber missile defense is specifically what we should be supporting, so as to avoid giving the NSA the impression that it literally can’t do anything without being called tyrannical.
Snowden argues that the metadata analysis necessary to make MonsterMind work, even defensively, is too invasive — but sniffing for malicious transmission types is precisely what the NSA is supposed to be doing with metadata. Additionally, Snowden’s first worry is based mostly on the idea that the NSA wouldn’t know much about the sender or receiver of the transmission, and would thus be acting blindly. This seems like a trumped up issue.
Let’s keep the scale of these retaliatory cyber attacks in mind; Snowden uses the example of a Russian hospital as a possible mistaken target, but if this did happen the result would be minimal. Even if the NSA was incapable of noticing such an obvious ploy, most of these attacks are investigative or malware-installing — they’re not causing explosions or anything. While I respect the rights of world citizens to be secure from spying, the NSA is simply keeping pace with global trends here; they’re unlikely to get the US in too much hot water with other countries since by doing so those other countries would open themselves to the very same international criticisms in the future. This is a much more questionable use of the whistleblower label than Snowden has embodied until now.
Perhaps Glenn Greenwald and others held back on a MonsterMind revelation because they decided there wasn’t a great enough public interest to warrant the possible dangers — though perhaps not, given that the Intercept retweeted a link to the MonsterMind article. This ambiguity is exactly why Snowden left releases up to The Guardian and others in the first place: they have large teams of lawyers and experts (not to mention representatives from the government) to provide perspective and make these decisions in a responsible way.
Again, to criticize the NSA for this program, in the context of its prior transgressions, is to say that all intelligence work is equally illegitimate. This isn’t just basically unfair, it also makes abuses far more likely — if you’re accused of criminal activity no matter what you do, it’s very easy to create a culture in which virtually anything is permitted. There are definitely problematic aspects to the MonsterMind program, but this is ultimately a well-intentioned initiative with some weaknesses, not a fundamentally invalid one designed from the ground up to subvert domestic and international justice. Let’s keep that distinction in mind.
I have been never-endingly impressed by Snowden’s ability to stick to his convictions and maintain the moral high ground over the past year or so. A big part of that has been his decision to stick with (or, depending on your point of view, hide behind) the journalistic organizations he entrusted with state secrets. We don’t know the specifics that led to this Wired interview, nor what Snowden’s personal or financial situation is today. There could be any number of factors leading to this shift in behavior — but he needs to be careful. His integrity is all that’s kept him in the running for acceptance by the American public; if he loses that, he’s lost everything.