In new research released today, roughly two years after the initial Snowden revelations, the Pew Research Center finds that U.S. citizens are aware of the surveillance programs revealed by Snowden, but are split on how they’ve responded to that knowledge. While just six percent are unaware entirely, 34 percent have taken at least one step to hide their information from the government and 40 percent of those under 50 have done so. Of the rest, 54 percent believe it would be “somewhat” or “very difficult” to do anything to avoid the surveillance, and are unaware of steps that would make it possible. Finally, the country is almost evenly split on whether there are appropriate checks and balances in place: 48 percent say the courts are balancing national security with the right to privacy appropriately.
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