I was very moved by Citizenfour and how the ideas presented got me thinking about possible points of departure for my research paper. One topic that I would like to pinpoint as a reflection of the documentary is this idea of the legality and psychology of surveillance. The entire idea of mass surveillance goes against our Constitutional rights but the documentary points out how after 9/11, digital surveillance began to be defended by the USA Patriot Act under the guise of defeating terrorism. The Patriot Act is an important law to discuss when dealing with the issue of surveillance as it is often viewed as the quote-unquote “birthplace” of the mass surveillance by the NSA. I find this topic to be of interest to me because it deals with the origins of surveillance but also poses the question of how surveillance to the degree we experience goes against the founding of our country. The issue of surveillance branches out and asks many questions about the constitutionality of watching people without their permission. Under this umbrella term of “legality of surveillance”, Snowden was charged with violating the Espionage Act because of how he exposed mass surveillance programs showing this abuse of the Espionage Act as Snowden can’t defend himself for giving citizens the truth about surveillance. Overall, there is a lot that goes under this topic like invoking the Constitution and other such documents proving surveillance unlawful but it is also one that can deal with the point of surveillance. Before one understands the legal side of this discussion it is important to also comprehend the reasoning behind surveillance which the documentary articulates nicely as being for the purposes of control. Under mass surveillance, the government essentially controls us and we have no real power as everything that a person is doing is being tracked and monitored.