Vice met with Edward Snowden to discuss surveillance states

Vice might get a bit of flak for its hipster approach to journalism at times, but it's also produced some pretty hard hitting documentaries and provided real insight into some of the stranger parts of the world. Its latest target in an upcoming episode is government surveillance, so company founder Shane Smith flew to Moscow to meet whistle blower Edward Snowden.

The upcoming episode of Vice News targets the surveillance states that have grown up in the aftermath of the 11th September attacks in 2001, looking at mass spying on populations, the lack of oversight and the power that reams of data and metadata on a person can give an organisation.

There are concerns over intelligence agencies spying on each other, on politicians, on foreign allies and individual citizens. Much of the data gathered is acquired without the need for a warrant and in some cases oversight committees aren't even aware of it. Indeed, there are allusions that intelligence agencies could spy on the groups designed to keep an eye on their activities.

All of these aspects are discussed by Smith and Snowden in the upcoming episode and we have our first look at it thanks to the new trailer release. This isn't just a Snowden episode though, as Smith also reaches out to other people campaigning to end the surveillance state in the U.S., including those from ex-government positions, who have unique insight into the practices of law enforcement and intelligence agencies.

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KitGuru Says: There's a bit of editing over-excitement for this piece and the Snowden tucked-chin looks a bit dramatic, but what he's talking about is serious. Here's hoping something interesting comes out of this, even if it's just a raising of awareness among more people. 

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