Thank you Mr Edward Snowden!

On the occasion of the European Day for the Protection of Personal Data that every year on 28 January reminds us of this serious matter, we, a sociology and psychology students’ group attending the course ” Sociology of Privacy and Surveillance” by Professor Minas Samatas, in the Department of Sociology, University of Crete , have authorized him to send this letter to the Greek press and the Guardian .

- We, like all young people who wish to use freely and enjoy the use of electronic devices (PC, mobile phones, Facebook, etc. ) with secured privacy without of any kind of interceptions or social sorting;

- We, who are attending this course and study the increased risks of a breach of our privacy by government agencies and businesses by collecting and processing of our personal data for security purposes or profit, often without our consent; we, who have compared the authoritarian surveillance of Greek citizens in post-war Greece with the new type of electronic surveillance in our age of electronic information, especially through telecommunications and social media, realizing that these new technologies pose serious potential risks of discrimination and exclusions for our future life chances;

- we, who were proud for the successful – albeit very expensive – Olympic Games in Athens in 2004 , and we are ashamed when we have learned about the humiliation by the prolong wiretappings of then Greek government and the entire political and military leadership until early 2006 , apparently by the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA),

We wish along with thousands of citizens around the world ,

to publicly express our gratitude to Edward Snowden , because:

a ) he showed selflessness and risked his life to reveal the massive interceptions of the NSA against even allies of the Americans,

b ) he documented the post- 11/9/2001 expansion on a global scale Orwellian surveillance system, a kind of super Big Brother, which together with the big sister – companies construct a nightmarish panopticon and pan-hearing landscape at the expense of freedom and democracy , and

c ) he caused the reaction of governments and citizens around the world to protect the communications’ privacy , even forcing President Obama to announce some limitations to the NSA’s activities.

- Based on the above reasons to thank Edward Snowden , we also ask the present Greek Government , who happens to chair now in the European Union , to take all necessary initiatives to be given him asylum in a safe country of his choice (and not of course in Greece, where, for instance, in the recent past innocent Pakistani immigrants who happened to have called their relatives in London had been kidnapped by foreign agents) .

- Finally , as Greek and European citizens who during the current period we are experiencing in our country a dramatic economic, political and social crisis with an uncertain future for the rights and hard- won freedoms by previous generations , leaving us the legacy of their custody, in order to live in a freer and truly democratic country, where the voice of young people is heard, we require our leaders to safeguard civil and political liberties, to strengthen the protection of our personal data and to shield the communications security, which are not only concerning the privacy of citizens, but also democracy and our national sovereignty, both issues of which have been undermined by the draconian memoranda.