What exactly did Edward Snowden do?

How many languages does Edward Snowden speak?

No, seriously.

He claims to speak 15 languages, including Russian and French, but he's being cagey about his real abilities. His mother, who speaks four languages and has taught English, Spanish and French, thinks he may actually know more than that.

"He has been speaking a language he does not learn in school," she told FoxNews.com. "I don't believe he knows any foreign language. I know he doesn't know German, and I don't think he knows French."

His father, Lon Snowden, said he's never heard of Edward using any other language than English. "The question of how many languages he speaks is still under investigation," he said. If we learned anything from the former CIA operative who turned whistleblower, it's that the answer is more important than the question. At this point, however, no one knows for sure. The truth can't be determined until Snowden releases his full dossier on the NSA, because only then will we know what languages he speaks, and what the languages say about him.

If you are looking for a good place to start, there is something to be said for watching "The Great Escape" -- the 1964 Steve McQueen film about a group of prisoners who escape from a German labor camp in World War II, and spend their lives trying to return to freedom. The film features one of the best-known English accents in all of cinema history.

It doesn't sound like any of the accents that Snowden would have had to endure as an intelligence analyst in China. Not in a million years.

So it's possible that he could know multiple languages, but that would make him a polyglot, not a bilinguist. Which, in English, means someone who can speak more than one language.

But it's also possible that Snowden's life experience has given him such a wide variety of first-hand experience with language that he's become adept at picking up many of them. Either way, the point is moot. He speaks enough to get by in more than one language, and we have to take his word for it.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and assume that Edward Snowden is not actually claiming that he speaks 15 languages, but rather that he knows them well enough to converse in them.

What exactly did Edward Snowden do?

If you don't have any idea, then you need to read this:

After a few years of following his case closely, I think I finally understand Snowden in a way that is both easy to appreciate and not particularly laudable.

For example, I see Snowden as someone who chose to take advantage of the power that the modern world has given him. And he did this in a rather peculiar way.

His job was to be part of what's called the "whistleblower class", and one of the main things they do is keep their secrets from getting out to the public. They use methods of whistleblowing that require the person in question to get caught. The more you can do in public, the less likely it is that you'll be heard, and the more likely that what you're doing will be kept secret.

This seems like a pretty clear cut case of rational self interest, right? In other words, it just seems like a sensible thing to do. It's in the individual's interest to make sure that if they ever choose to be caught and charged with some sort of crime, that it won't involve a career limiting event, like being sent to prison.

And in theory, that's a good thing. The world needs to know about some of the worst things that happen in it. But that doesn't mean that everything that happens is a good thing. Most of what goes on at the highest level is actually completely unnecessary, and doesn't accomplish much more than it does when a lot of that effort is simply funneled into the pockets of corporations, instead of into public service or public benefit.

But even if there's a clear incentive for anyone who does this sort of thing, that doesn't actually mean that this is the right path for an individual to take. For example, consider the case of the former CIA agent who exposed torture in 2024. He didn't just get paid to leak that information. He was also involved in an organisation dedicated to fighting torture. They were working with a group called the ACLU which was actually helping US citizens in prison, and was actively seeking to expose information on other government actions such as warrantless surveillance.

What has happened to Edward Snowden?

It is a question that has become almost impossible to answer with certainty, as the former CIA technical assistant has kept a low profile in Russia for more than a year.

However, his girlfriend has recently spoken out, suggesting Snowden is under invisible pressure to return to the US. The ex-contractor has never revealed any details about what his new life might be like, but his friends believe that he may not have escaped totally unscathed. While his life is certainly more comfortable in Russia than it was at his home in Hawaii, he still struggles to find meaningful work.

The Guardian's Washington bureau chief, Laura Poitras, had to fight for more than four years to win access to Snowden's collection of top secret documents after the former CIA employee handed over thousands of files to reporters at the newspaper. Since then, the film-maker has worked tirelessly to bring his story to audiences in her film Citizenfour, which has been nominated for three Academy Awards. Poitras has given a rare interview to the Guardian about her relationship with the whistleblower and her fears that he may never return to America.

Laura Poitras: We talked for a long time last night. He knows I've spent two months getting him to talk to me, but he's never given a press conference. He's never done anything else. So it's not like he's not on the record about anything. And when I met him in June, I felt so relieved that I finally understood what it meant to say a person is an icon. He was actually not a person but an idea, an idea that stood for all the other people who did the same work. I had that idea in my head of who Edward was and he lived up to it. He made me feel that I could go into this world that I thought I would never be allowed to enter. And now we are actually being given a glimpse into that world, and to learn a little bit more about it. So that's what we're dealing with.

We're going to get into a little bit of his family and his friends and the people who live in this world, so that people can decide for themselves. There are a lot of people who don't like Edward, and I'm not surprised by that. He did break the law.

Where does Snowden live now?

Where does he work?

We don't know.

On Sunday, Edward Snowden stepped out of the news for the first time in a year. He was "in transit" on his way from Hong Kong to Moscow.

His disclosures about secret US surveillance programs have won him accolades and infamy. A federal judge ruled that he could be charged with treason in the US.

But no one knows what the future holds for him. And even when he leaves Russia, it's not entirely clear what he wants to do next.

He has said he wants to go home, but whether that's the US or the UK or some other country is not known. And if he does want to return home, it seems he has no place to go.

Snowden told the Guardian: "I've been told over the last year that I'm free to travel wherever I want. So I'm in transit. I don't know when I'll be able to stay for a while. But as long as I can stay for a while."

His lawyer says he wants to go to Latin America to "start a new life". "He will have more time to think about what to do in the future," said Carlos Lozada. "We will be back with more information in the coming days."

We spoke to Snowden, who has previously appeared on a number of TV shows and gave a series of interviews to the Guardian since he revealed the NSA's top-secret PRISM system. What do you want to happen now? Do you want to return to the US, or the UK? Or do you just want to start a new life? Snowden: "I don't know where I want to live. I really don't know."

That's not much of answer. Can you elaborate on that?" Is that because you don't know what to do next? Snowden: "It's because I haven't thought that through." But you've given a lot of interviews, talked to a lot of people, and you know what's right for you. What is it that you feel would best for you right now? I haven't really thought about that.