Latest Laura Poitras Quotes from Interviews

• The fact that the CIA knew that two of the 9/11 hijackers were entering the United States and didn't notify the FBI and that nobody lost their job is shocking. Instead, we occupied Iraq, which had nothing to do with 9/11. I mean, how did those choices get made?

  Laura Poitras

  Jobs, Mean, Two

  Source: www.motherjones.com

• In terms of sources coming forward, I really reject this idea of talking about one, two, three sources. There are many sources that have informed the reporting we've done and I think that Americans owe them a debt of gratitude for taking the risk they do.

  Laura Poitras

  Gratitude, Thinking, Talking

  Source: www.motherjones.com

• From a personal perspective, because I'm on a watchlist and went through years of trying to find out why, of having the government refuse to confirm or deny the very existence of such a list, it's so meaningful to have its existence brought into the open so that the public knows there is a watchlist, and so that the courts can now address the legality of it. I mean, the person who revealed this has done a huge public service and I'm personally thankful.

  Laura Poitras

  Meaningful, Government, Years

  Source: www.motherjones.com

• Just consider the CIA and its effort to suppress the Senate's review of its torture program. Take in the fact that we live in a country that a) legalized torture and b) where no one was ever held to account for it, and now the government's internal look at what happened is being suppressed by the CIA. That's a frightening landscape to be in.

  Laura Poitras

  Country, Government, Effort

  Source: www.motherjones.com

• So my first experience was that I had to do a reboot of my expectations. Like fantastic, great, he's young and charismatic and I was like wow, this is so disorienting, I have to reboot. In retrospect, I can see that it's really powerful that somebody [Snowden] so smart, so young, and with so much to lose risked so much.

  Laura Poitras

  Powerful, Smart, Expectations

• Snowden is almost preternaturally prepossessing and self-possessed. I think of a novelist whose dream character just walks into his or her head. It must have been like that with you and Snowden. But what if he'd been a graying guy with the same documents and far less intelligent things to say about them? In other words, how exactly did who he was make your movie and remake our world?

  Laura Poitras

  Dream, Character, Intelligent

  Source: www.motherjones.com

• I was in correspondence with an anonymous source for about five months and in the process of developing a dialogue you build ideas, of course, about who that person might be. My idea was that he was in his late forties, early fifties. I figured he must be Internet generation because he was super tech-savvy, but I thought that, given the level of access and information he was able to discuss, he had to be older.

  Laura Poitras

  Ideas, Generations, Levels

• We've already seen shifts happening in some of the big companies - Google, Apple - that now understand how vulnerable their customer data is, and that if it's vulnerable, then their business is, too, and so you see a beefing up of encryption technologies. At the same time, no programs have been dismantled at the governmental level, despite international pressure.

  Laura Poitras

  Technology, Data, Apples

• Snowden has presented us with choices on how we want to move forward into the future. We're at a crossroads and we still don't quite know which path we're going to take. Without Snowden, just about everyone would still be in the dark about the amount of information the government is collecting. I think that Snowden has changed consciousness about the dangers of surveillance.

  Laura Poitras

  Moving, Dark, Thinking

  Source: www.motherjones.com

• Those who are experts in the fields of surveillance, privacy, and technology say that there need to be two tracks: a policy track and a technology track. The technology track is encryption. It works and if you want privacy, then you should use it.

  Laura Poitras

  Technology, Two, Track

  Source: www.motherjones.com

• Certainly, when it comes to my profession as a journalist, that allows the government to trace what you're reporting, who you're talking to, and where you've been. So no matter whether or not I have a commitment to protect my sources, the government may still have information that might allow them to identify whom I'm talking to.

  Laura Poitras

  Commitment, Government, Talking

  Source: www.motherjones.com

• The most striking thing Snowden has revealed is the depth of what the NSA and the Five Eyes countries [Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Great Britain, and the US] are doing, their hunger for all data, for total bulk dragnet surveillance where they try to collect all communications and do it all sorts of different ways. Their ethos is "collect it all."

  Laura Poitras

  Country, Communication, Eye

  Source: www.motherjones.com

• I think one of the most shocking things is how little our elected officials knew about what the NSA was doing. Congress is learning from the reporting and that's staggering. Snowden and [former NSA employee] William Binney, who's also in the film as a whistleblower from a different generation, are technical people who understand the dangers.

  Laura Poitras

  Thinking, Nsa, People

  Source: www.motherjones.com

• In all my work, I'm interested in trying to understand the human consequences of government policies.

  Laura Poitras

  Government, Trying, Policy

  "Laura Poitras Talks CITIZENFOUR, Her First Impression of Edward Snowden, Her Commitment to Fearless Adversarial Journalism and More". Interview with Sheila Roberts, collider.com. October 26, 2014.

• There are people who are always going to try to engage in activity that is illegal and they're going to try to subvert surveillance. But everybody should not give up their liberties and rights to privacy because some people are going to [do that]. We shouldn't stop or limit our basic liberties because some people are going to engage in criminal activities.

  Laura Poitras

  Giving Up, Rights, People

  "Laura Poitras Talks CITIZENFOUR, Her First Impression of Edward Snowden, Her Commitment to Fearless Adversarial Journalism and More". Interview with Sheila Roberts, collider.com. October 26, 2014.

• We're definitely in an era where the government wants to keep more secrets and it wants to come after anyone who's exposing those secrets and in many cases exposing government illegality. They're coming after the journalists and they're coming after the whistleblowers. It's not a good sign if the government is expending much energy trying to find out who journalists are talking to.

  Laura Poitras

  Government, Talking, Secret

  "Laura Poitras Talks CITIZENFOUR, Her First Impression of Edward Snowden, Her Commitment to Fearless Adversarial Journalism and More". Interview with Sheila Roberts, collider.com. October 26, 2014.

• One of the things that I think is true is that encryption actually is able to secure our communications, that every individual can use encryption, and that it's accessible and in many cases free.

  Laura Poitras

  Communication, Thinking, Encryption

  "Laura Poitras Talks CITIZENFOUR, Her First Impression of Edward Snowden, Her Commitment to Fearless Adversarial Journalism and More". Interview with Sheila Roberts, collider.com. October 26, 2014.

• In all my work, I'm interested in understanding big issues through the lives of individuals.

  Laura Poitras

  Issues, Understanding, Individual

  "Ask the Filmmaker". Live chat, www.pbs.org.

• I don't speak Arabic - I know a little to get by, but that's all.

  Laura Poitras

  Littles, Speak, Knows

  "Ask the Filmmaker". Live chat, www.pbs.org. September 21, 2010.

• It's not everyday that a whistleblower is actually willing to be identified.

  Laura Poitras

  Everyday, Whistleblowers, Willing

  "Tomgram: Laura Poitras and Tom Engelhardt, The Snowden Reboot". Interview with Tom Engelhardt, www.tomdispatch.com. October 19, 2014.

• People are starting to understand that the devices we carry with us reveal our location, who we're talking to, and all kinds of other information.

  Laura Poitras

  Talking, People, Information

  "Tomgram: Laura Poitras and Tom Engelhardt, The Snowden Reboot". Interview with Tom Engelhardt, www.tomdispatch.com. October 19, 2014.

• One of the most frightening things, I think, is the capacity for retroactive searching, so you can go back in time and trace who someone is in contact with and where they've been.

  Laura Poitras

  Thinking, Capacity, Go Back In Time

  "Tomgram: Laura Poitras and Tom Engelhardt, The Snowden Reboot". Interview with Tom Engelhardt, www.tomdispatch.com. October 19, 2014.

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