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DeFi and Credit Risk

Edward Snowden, a well-known leaker of government secrets who is also president of the Freedom of the Press Foundation, thinks that cryptocurrencies are more valuable as tools than as investments.

"I use it to use bitcoin. I used bitcoin to pay for the servers anonymously in 2013 "Snowden said this on Saturday at the Consensus 2022 conference held by CoinDesk in Austin, Texas. In 2013, he got a lot of attention when he leaked secret information about how the National Security Agency watched U.S. citizens.

"In general, I don't tell people to put their money in cryptocurrencies as a technology, and this is what sets me apart from a lot of people in the community," he said.

Snowden also defended the crypto industry after a group of tech experts criticized cryptocurrency and blockchain technology in a letter to U.S. lawmakers earlier this month. The letter was meant to counter the crypto industry's lobbying efforts.

Snowden said he thinks the signatories were trying to misunderstand the crypto industry on purpose by using the same old arguments over and over again.

Snowden said, "The letter makes a case for the way things are now." "There are a lot of ways to deal with all of their worries. People who signed this letter could all understand this business. They should for sure."

Snowden did say that he liked cryptographer Bruce Schneier's work, and Schneier was one of the main people who signed the letter. But Snowden said that many of the people who signed the letter were "public trolls" who were always making trouble.

Privacy got better

When asked about the current state of privacy on the internet, Snowden said that he thinks a lot of progress has been made in encrypting the content of communications, but he is still worried about metadata, which are the records that show that communications took place.

Snowden said, "Think of it like a van with dark windows going down the highway." "You can't see who's in the van, but you can see where it started, where it went, how long it took, and other things like that," he said.

Snowden said, "We need to make sure that no one can see that level." "More transactions need to be the same, so that everyone drives the same kind of vans and gets lost in the crowd."

After Snowden's leak in 2013, the U.S. charged him with espionage and gave him asylum in Russia. In 2020, he was given the right to live there permanently.

Snowden was honest when asked what he thought about the war in Ukraine. He said he wished it hadn't started and hoped it would end as soon as possible.

"I haven't said much about the crisis in Ukraine because I know my words won't be given the attention they deserve. They won't talk about the setting, "he said.

He also said that he is writing about the war and that he will eventually publish his work.

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