In the New York offices of Ben Wizner, the American Civil Liberties Union attorney who represents Edward Snowden, sits a telepresence robot constantly representing the exiled whistleblower. As the German newspaper Tagespiegel reported Wednesday, the robot is “a screen on stilts, with electrical rollers for legs,” and Snowden has the ability to control the robot from Moscow.
The robot is likely the same $16,000 Beam robot that he used to speak at the TED conference in March 2014.
Tagespiegel’s Julia Prosinger was at the ACLU for a week spending time with the digital avatar of the former National Security Agency contractor.
“Sometimes when Wizner has to answer the phone quickly to get rid of another journalist, Snowden moves around the offices of his new friends as a robot and discusses constitutional law with them,” the paper noted.
via Ars Technica
Image: TED
