If the number is "1 of his other clients" it is just as bad.
This is the educational problem we face ('we' being people who have the particular libertarian bent that Ladar is showing with his actions here). The masses, on all sides of the political spectrum, do not understand just how truly special our constitution is, and how offended they should be that the current holders of office are trampling it underfoot in so many ways. The 4th amendment could be paraphrased as "if officers of the state don't have good reason to think you're guilty, they have no right to invade your person in any way".
If we were talking about a fluke whereby the FBI, in the process of intercepting Snowden's communications, mistakenly saw the SMTP traffic of an innocent user of lavabit, OK, mistakes happen. But that's not what's going on here. The FBI requested, and was granted by a federal judge, the ability to search people for whom it had no probable cause of criminal action. Ladar's side brings this up in hopes that the judge will understand that more narrow measures would be just as useful to the FBI, without violating anyone's 4th amendment rights (including Snowden's since he did break the law) and without destroying the core of his business.
At least for citizens of the US, if the government isn't prepared to arrest you and press charges against you, it's supposed to leave you the heck alone.
As far as I know, Edward Snowden has not been tried and convicted in any US jurisdiction that I am aware of. I typically do not like being pedantic, but I can say if I was on that jury I would be hard-pressed not to push for jury nullification (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jury_nullification).
If you want to be pedantic, per your link jury nullification occurs in cases where the jury agrees the defendant is guilty but deserves to be acquitted nevertheless. Or in other words, did break the law.
The Guardian[1] is notorious for typos and other little inaccuracies (mostly back from the non-digital printing days, but they proudly keep the tradition going even with modern presses.)
1. a.k.a. The Grauniad. www.grauniad.co.uk redirects to theguardian.com
I thought that - I wondered if that was only the number who were paying? In fairness though, the SSL cert would compromise even those who weren't..so I guess you're right.
Funny, as the number is 10 times higher, als stated by the guardian itself in the linked post.
Not that it matters, 40.000 would be just as bad.