The saga of fugitive US intelligence leaker Edward Snowden took new turns, with new revelations about the depth of US surveillance and his apparent disavowal of the actions of his father Lon Snowden’s legal team, even as the elder man goes to Russia to visit his son.

Snowden used an encrypted email service to tell The Huffington Post’s Michael Calderone to say that neither his father Lon Snowden, his father’s lawyer Bruce Fein, nor Fein's wife and spokeswoman Mattie Fein “represent me in any way.”

He specifically accuses the Feins of “misrepresenting” him to the media in the United States.  The Feins had earlier trashed Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald, and claimed divisions on Team Snowden.

“I've been fortunate to have legal advice from an international team of some of the finest lawyers in the world, and to work with journalists whose integrity and courage are beyond question,” Snowden said. “There is no conflict amongst myself and any of the individuals or organizations with whom I have been involved.”

Edward Snowden is somewhere in Russia, enjoying his one-year of asylum. 

Meanwhile, The Washington Post reports that the US National Security Agency has broken privacy rules or overstepped its legal authority thousands of times each year since Congress granted the agency broad new powers in 2008.  That’s according to documents that Snowden provided to the Washington Post earlier this year, apparently before he promised not to leak anything more in order to get asylum in Russia.

When they do wrongly eavesdrop on Internet or telecom communications, either intentionally or accidentally, NSA agents are instructed to remove details and substitute more generic language in reports to the higher-ups.  That’s what is officially known as “plausible deniability”.