"Encryption is defense against the Dark Arts," National Security Agency leaker Edward Snowden said via Google Hangout to an audience at South by Southwest in Austin, Texas, on Monday. Snowden and the second panelist, Chris Soghoian, as well as moderator Ben Wizner (both from the ACLU), each began the discussion with the same assumption: that mass surveillance is inherently bad.

Why, Wizner asked, had Snowden chosen to make his first public remarks since fleeing the U.S. to a tech festival, rather than, say, a policy community in Washington D.C.? Snowden responded, "There is a policy response that needs to occur. There is also a technical response that needs to occur."

Here, I'll break down the SXSW panel's technological solutions to the problem of mass surveillance. You can read more about the policy recommendations here and here.