On Sunday, the former NSA contractor left Hong Kong on a commercial flight, landed in Moscow, and was reportedly picked up by Venezuelan diplomats in the Russian capital.

Ricardo Patino, the foreign minister of Ecuador, wrote on Twitter: "The Government of Ecuador has received an asylum request from Edward J. Snowden."

Russia’s Interfax news agency reports that Snowden is spending the night in Moscow before heading for Havana, Cuba. He will then continue on to Caracas, Venezuela. WikiLeaks issued a statement saying that it was helping move Snowden around the globe.

The minimization procedures say that the NSA has to destroy the communication it receives once it's determined as domestic unless they can demonstrate a few facts about it.

In other words, if your messages are encrypted, the NSA is keeping them until they can decrypt them. And, furthermore, as we noted earlier, the basic default is that if the NSA isn't sure about anything, it can keep your data. And, if it discovers anything at all remotely potentially criminal about your data, it can keep it, even if it didn't collect it for that purpose.

Free Speech week is an annual celebration that features events, discussions and editorial promoting the First Amendment.

"The motion picture and television industry has always and will continue to be at the forefront of advancing free expression and encouraging creativity and innovation through The First Amendment," said Dodd in a statement. "[W]e welcome this opportunity to celebrate our steadfast commitment to these important principles."

Technically, everything can be recorded, so restrictions on what analysts can access are based solely on IT policy. In practice that means data filters are set at "widest allowable aperture," and if data leaves US borders it's automatically scooped.

"If I target for example an email address, for example under FAA 702, and that email address sent something to you, Joe America, the analyst gets it. All of it. IPs, raw data, content, headers, attachments, everything. And it gets saved for a very long time – and can be extended further with waivers rather than warrants," he said.

"Being called a traitor by Dick Cheney is the highest honor you can give an American, and the more panicked talk we hear from people like him, Feinstein, and King, the better off we all are," he said.

Rep. Jerrold Nadler, a New York Democrat, disclosed on Thursday that during a secret briefing to members of Congress, he was told that the contents of a phone call could be accessed "simply based on an analyst deciding that."

If the NSA wants "to listen to the phone," an analyst's decision is sufficient, without any other legal authorization required, Nadler said he learned. "I was rather startled," said Nadler, an attorney and congressman who serves on the House Judiciary committee.

There are serious "constitutional problems" with this approach, said Kurt Opsahl, a senior staff attorney at the Electronic Frontier Foundation who has litigated warrantless wiretapping cases. "It epitomizes the problem of secret laws."

Lucas' and Spielberg's comments -- alongside those of Xbox executive Don Mattrick at the panel on the sidelines of the E3 gaming conference -- come as the movie industry is starting a record season of "tentpole" films -- the mega-budget film that studios place all their bets on.

After the tentpoles buckle, Lucas predicts a shift that makes going to a movie like going to a Broadway show -- an entertainment outing loaded up with bells and whistles that may cost you up to $150 per ticket.

The movie's distributor, Open Road Films, announced the new release date on Wednesday, according to Deadline Hollywood. The film was initially scheduled for a nationwide release on April 19 but was reportedly pushed back for marketing reasons.

"Jobs" portrays the early life and career of the late Apple leader, traveling from 1971 through 2001 to follow his up-and-down path from college dropout to CEO of the company he co-created.

A majority of Americans – 56% – say the National Security Agency’s (NSA) program tracking the telephone records of millions of Americans is an acceptable way for the government to investigate terrorism, though a substantial minority – 41% – say it is unacceptable.

Currently 62% say it is more important for the federal government to investigate possible terrorist threats, even if that intrudes on personal privacy.

Apple relied on a “complex web of offshore entities” and U.S. tax loopholes to avoid paying billions of dollars in U.S. taxes on $44 billion in offshore income over the past four years, according to excerpts from a Senate subcommittee report to be released tomorrow as Apple CEO Tim Cook testifies on the company’s overseas operations.

“Apple wasn’t satisfied with shifting its profits to a low-tax offshore tax haven,” Sen. Levin said in today’s statement. “Apple sought the Holy Grail of tax avoidance. It has created offshore entities holding tens of billions of dollars, while claiming to be tax resident nowhere.”

Those who upgraded to Windows 8 aren't the only ones unhappy with the new touch-driven operating system - Wall Street is too. Just don't expect any of the criticism hurled at Steve "Teflon" Ballmer, Microsoft's shy and retiring boss, to stick.

But all roads leads to Windows, and version 8 of the operating system is actually Microsoft's second major disaster in something it's supposed to be able to do with its eyes shut: its second "New Coke moment", if you will. The first was Windows Vista, Microsoft's last big bet to reinvent the software industry with a brand new user interface, web communications layer and storage subsystem.