NSA whisteblower Edward Snowden gave a rare public speech Monday at the South by Southwest Interactive Festival in Austin, Texas. It was the first time Snowden has directly addressed a U.S. audience since he left the country last May. Snowden spoke via video stream from Russia, where he has been granted asylum.

Edward Snowden: “The NSA, the sort of global mass surveillance that’s occurring in all of these countries, not just the U.S. — and it’s important to remember that this is a global issue — they’re setting fire to the future of the Internet. And the people who are in this room now, you guys are all the firefighters. If data is being clandestinely acquired, and the public doesn’t have any way to review it, and it’s not legislatively authorized, it’s not reviewed by courts, it’s not consonant with our Constitution, that’s a problem.”

Snowden added that he believes his whistleblowing has improved U.S. security and that he wouldn’t hesitate to leak the same NSA files again. Journalist Glenn Greenwald also addressed the festival later in the day, following a speech by WikiLeaks’ Julian Assange on Saturday via video stream from the Ecuadorean Embassy in London, where he has sought political asylum since 2012.