The time of the year when when people is almost upon us and despite the chill wave blanketing the country, Christmas seems to have thawed the heart of officials at the National Security Agency (NSA), which is pondering offering amnesty to its former contractor Edward Snowden in exchange of the sensitive documents that he might still have in possession.
After Snowden leaked sensitive information regarding NSA's surveillance activities, dubbed PRISM, earlier this year, NSA received a lot of criticism. However, following months of PR problem for the government and technology companies involved in siphoning data of citizens, an amnesty can be considered a non-dramatic, if not too-good-to-be-true, ending to the story.
Snowden received asylum in Moscow and latest reports say that he may still have more than a million classified documents that he can expose.
CBS News was able to interview the head of the NSA task force handling the Snowden leak Rick Ledgett. During the interview, Ledgett disclosed the possibilities of sealing a deal with Snowden to prevent further damage to the agency and the national security.
"So, my personal view is, yes, it's worth having a conversation about. I would need assurances that the remainder of the data could be secured, and my bar for those assurances would be very high. It would be more than just an assertion on his part," said Ledgett when asked whether granting an amnesty to Snowden is an option.
During the interview, General Keith Alexander, who heads the NSA, was also present and he was clear that he does not agree to the suggestions of amnesty
According to Alexander, "This is analogous to a hostage-taker taking 50 people hostage, shooting 10 and then say, 'If you give me full amnesty, I'll let the other 40 go.' What do you do?"
"I think people have to be held accountable for their actions... Because what we don't want is the next person to do the same thing, race off to Hong Kong and to Moscow with another set of data, knowing they can strike the same deal," Alexander said.
Snowden needs to face criminal charges filed against him by the Justice Department in June, following communication of intel information to unauthorized parties, stealing government property, and disclosure of sensitive defense information without authority. The department has not commented on the possibility of giving amnesty to the former NSA contractor.
It is safe to assume that the story will not end this holiday season and if the U.S. government plays Santa, it will not just double check if Snowden has been good or bad.
On Saturday, The New York Times reported that those investigating the extent of data extracted by Snowden from its system remain puzzled.
"They've spent hundreds and hundreds of man-hours trying to reconstruct everything he has gotten, and they still don't know all of what he took. I know that seems crazy, but everything with this is crazy," an unnamed senior official of the administration was cited as saying by the publication.
