(Lluis Baldirà)

In 2006, James Risen, a reporter for the New York Times, wrote the book State of War, which holds that the National Security Agency US (NSA, for its acronym in English) was intervening telephone calls of citizens. The US government demanded that Risen testify against one of his alleged sources. However, the First Amendment to the Constitution protects the right of journalists to publish classified information, whether it is in the public interest. Risen refused to testify. In 2015, the government stopped demanding Risen to testify. Prosecutors had illegally obtained the records of your phone and email as well as information on their bank accounts and travel, which used to convict Jeffrey Sterling, the alleged CIA informant Risen. "We run the risk that the press can not do the job that the First Amendment is supposed to protect because of the large volume of government spy." "Governments around the world are constantly developing new techniques of espionage that put us all at risk ". As government surveillance progresses, the media can not perform checks and balances under the protection of the First Amendment. However, there has been a strong surveillance technology, which allows journalists to protect their anonymous sources; for example, securedrop, a platform of open source software, which allows people to upload documents securely and anonymously to the website of a newspaper way. Unfortunately, technology monitoring governments around the world is getting more advanced time.Society needs to create simple tools for reporting, for anyone-not just technology experts like Edward Snowden- can expose abuse within a company or society feasible and safe manner. In the background, the First Amendment does not protect the rights of informants, but also those of all US citizens. https://www.ted.com/talks/trevor_timm_how_free_is_our_freedom_of_the_press?language=es Lluis Baldirà