No Place to Hide
by Glenn Greenwald · first published 2013
29% recommend71% neutral
Why HN recommends it
Firsthand account from the journalist who worked on the Snowden files, covering the NSA surveillance programs and how the government and press responded; recommended for readers wanting context on mass surveillance.
Summarised by Claude from recommending comments
The story of one of the greatest national security leaks in US history. In June 2013, reporter and political commentator Glenn Greenwald published a series of reports in the Guardian which rocked the world. The reports revealed shocking truths about the extent to which the National Security Agency had been gathering information about US citizens and intercepting communication worldwide, and were based on documents leaked by former National Security Agency employee Edward Snowden to Greenwald. Including new revelations from documents entrusted to Greenwald by Snowden.
Affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
Related books
2014–2026Endurance; Shackleton's incredible voyage
Alfred Lansing
Recommended by 17 · mentioned by 2617 recommend · 26 mention17 recommend · 2617 recommend
2014–2025Essentialism
Greg McKeown
Recommended by 20 · mentioned by 2620 recommend · 26 mention20 recommend · 2620 recommend
2013–2026The Martian
Andy Weir
Recommended by 117 · mentioned by 207117 recommend · 207 mention117 recommend · 207117 recommend
2011–2026Ready Player One
Ernest Cline
Recommended by 123 · mentioned by 287123 recommend · 287 mention123 recommend · 287123 recommend
2007–2026A short history of nearly everything
Bill Bryson
Recommended by 102 · mentioned by 123102 recommend · 123 mention102 recommend · 123102 recommend
2007–2026House of Leaves
Mark Z. Danielewski
Recommended by 59 · mentioned by 13959 recommend · 139 mention59 recommend · 13959 recommend
2008–2026The Left Hand of Darkness
Ursula K. Le Guin
Recommended by 118 · mentioned by 184118 recommend · 184 mention118 recommend · 184118 recommend
…hang him?" In today's surveillance society it's intelligent to limit your footprint, which is exactly the chilling effect free speech and free society advocates are worried about. (Glenn Greenwald's "No Place to Hide" is a great read on the topic.)
on “Parler is back online after a month of downtime” ↗I'd recommend you read Greenwald's book, "No Place to Hide". Snowden was not exactly "low-level", he was in training for operations. He backed down to a low-level position by choice when he wanted greater access to documents. He even took a pay cut to do so.
on “On the new Snowden documents” ↗Another relevant read is "No Place to Hide" (!) by Glenn Greenwald, the journalist working on the Snowden file disclosures: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18213403-no-place-to-hid...
on “Nothing to Hide – a documentary about surveillance and you [video]” ↗A non-amzazon link to the poster's excellent recommendation https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/70078.No_Place_to_Hide [edit: punctuation]
on “Nothing to Hide – a documentary about surveillance and you [video]” ↗Glenn Greenwald - No Place to Hide Reason why isn't necessarily because of the specifics of the 2013 leaks, but because he documents the interaction between government and press (and how he was demonized and threatened afterwards). Tl;dr…
on “Ask HN: Best books read in 2022” ↗I used to call everything a conspiracy theory, but then Glenn Greenwald published "No Place to Hide: Edward Snowden, the NSA and the Surveillance State". Now i know that reality is worse than the worst conspiracy theorist.
on “GLM-5.3: Frontier Coding with Emergent Cyber Capabilities” ↗No Place to Hide By Glenn Greenwald and Uncanny Valley By Anna Wiener
on “Ask HN: Dystopian Sci-fi books that take place in San Francisco to recommend?” ↗I'm currently reading Glenn Greenwald's new book, NO PLACE TO HIDE, and I have to say that a person should take much comfort in the fact that Fastmail is in Australia rather than the U.S. Australia is a member country in what the NSA terms the "Five Eyes" (U.S., U.K.,…
on “From Gmail to Fastmail” ↗In the Greenwald book (No Place to Hide) he describes how Microsoft made a real effort with Skype and their Dropbox clone to open them up to the NSA. Now I have read these revelations, I feel that not trusting Microsoft is a sensible default.
on “True Goodbye: ‘Using TrueCrypt Is Not Secure’” ↗Page 123 of the documents released in Glenn Greenwald's "No Place To Hide" lists at least 37 countries (that the United States has cyber partnerships with). http://cryptome.org/2014/05/npth-docs-compare.pdf (on page 16 of the link)
on “Core Secrets: NSA Saboteurs in China and Germany” ↗…short, easy to read Guantanamo Diary, Mohamedou Ould Slahi - Diary of a Guantanamo prisoner who has been imprisoned since 2002. The US has never charged him with a crime. Profound and disturbing. 5/5 No place to hide, Glenn Greenwald - Story on Edward Snowden, probably read by most of HN. Enjoyed it, that's it. 4/5 How to lie with statistics, Darrel Huff - Short book on statistics, easy to read and fun. 4/5
on “Ask HN: Books you read in 2015?” ↗…or comment to the story, to make sure they didn't get anything wrong, and to see if there's a any reason to withhold details (a reason beyond "It's classified so don't"). In fact, in Greenwald's book No Place to Hide, he describes how they held off publishing for several days while waiting for a response from the government. Greenwald was so frustrated with the delays that he considered quitting the Guardian and going…
on “Obama Commutes Bulk of Chelsea Manning’s Sentence” ↗…the day. But I was under the impression that Greenwald tendency of "railing" about things, like the Iraq War, was what made Snowden aware and trusting of Greenwald: https://thetyee.ca/Books/2014/05/30/No-Place-to-Hide/ > In my own exploration of the blogosphere over a decade ago, I soon ran across Glenn Greenwald. In some ways he seemed to break the rules of writing online: he wrote long blog posts composed of long…
on “The Intercept cuts back” ↗…happens to be Greenwald's husband. His involvement was to put the weight of his name to defend his husband's actions. And yes, I look down on Greenwald now, while I used to look up to him when I read 'No Place to Hide', for a variety of reasons. Bolsonaro is a Trump-like clown but make a little research why people voted on the clown first.
on “Glenn Greenwald Charged with Cybercrimes in Brazil” ↗…bound for foreign countries. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cisco_Systems#Firewall_backdoo... "A document included in the trove of National Security Agency files released with Glenn Greenwald's book No Place to Hide details how the agency's Tailored Access Operations (TAO) unit and other NSA employees intercept servers, routers and other network gear being shipped to organizations targeted for surveillance and install…
on “We purchased a machine from China and it came with malware preinstalled” ↗