Snowden's Box: Trust in the Age of Surveillance

Jessica Bruder · Dale Maharidge

Feb 2020 · Tantor Media Inc · Narrated by Chloe Cannon and Jonathan Todd Ross

About this audiobook

One day in the spring of 2013, a box appeared outside a fourth-floor apartment door in Brooklyn, New York. The recipient, who didn't know the sender, only knew she was supposed to bring this box to a friend, who would ferry it to another friend. This was Edward Snowden's box-materials proving that the US government had built a massive surveillance apparatus and used it to spy on its own people-and the friend on the end of this chain was filmmaker Laura Poitras. Thus the biggest national security leak of the digital era was launched via a remarkably analog network, the US Postal Service. This is just one of the odd, ironic details that emerges from the story of how Jessica Bruder and Dale Maharidge, two experienced journalists but security novices (and the friends who received and ferried the box) got drawn into the Snowden story as behind-the-scenes players. Their initially stumbling, increasingly paranoid, and sometimes comic efforts to help bring Snowden's leaks to light, and ultimately, to understand their significance, unfold in an engrossing narrative that includes emails and diary entries from Poitras. This is an illuminating story on the status of transparency, privacy, and trust in the age of surveillance.

About the author

Jessica Bruder is the author of Nomadland, which was named a New York Times Notable Book and Editors' Choice and a finalist for the J. Anthony Lukas Prize and the Helen Bernstein Book Award. She writes for WIRED, New York Magazine, Harper's Magazine, the New York Times, and the Guardian, among other publications.

Dale Maharidge is the author of Pulitzer Prize-winning And Their Children After Them, and twelve other books. Among them is Journey to Nowhere: The Saga of the New Underclass, which inspired Bruce Springsteen to write the song "Youngstown."

Audiobook narration seized Chloe Cannon's interest when reading aloud to local seniors, who informed her that her reading sounded "just like their audiobooks!" Since then, she has narrated titles in a variety of genres, including young adult, sci-fi/fantasy, romance, self-help, thriller/suspense, and biography.

Jonathan Todd Ross has narrated over 120 audiobooks across a wide variety of genres. An Audie Award winner, he is also the recipient of numerous YALSA and AudioFile Earphones Awards. Jonathan loves narrating all genres, bringing the author's words to audio-life.