Congressional Commitee Rips Yahoo Execs

A number of readers sent word of the hearing by the US House Foreign Affairs Committee in which committee members raked two Yahoo execs over the coals. "While technologically and financially you are giants, morally you are pygmies," the committee chairman Tom Lantos, D-Calif., said angrily after hearing from Jerry Yang and Michael Callahan about Yahoo's actions that resulted in the arrest and imprisonment of a Chinese dissident. In 2004 Yahoo turned over information about journalist Shi Tao's online activities requested by Chinese authorities. In Feb. 2006, Yahoo's General Counsel Callahan testified that he had not known the nature of the investigation the authorities were conducting. He later learned that several employees of Yahoo China were aware at the time that the investigation involved "state secrets," but Callahan did not go back to Congress to amend his testimony. Committee members were withering in their disdain for Yahoo's refusal to help Shi Tao's family after his arrest.

Comments

PKB

[mastershake_phd]

Isn't that like the pot calling the kettle black?

Re:PKB

[joebagodonuts]

Oh please. This isn't about the reprehensibility of Yahoo's actions. This is about Congress being hypocritical. Neither party gives a hoot about the journalist getting jailed.

The irony here is that Yahoo's simply following the leadership that our elected leaders demonstrate. If our leaders have a problem with what's going on, they might want to look at how they are leading this nation, rather than hold disingenuous hearings.

So - the kettle/pot comments are appropriate considering the subject matter. And before you go much further condemning Yahoo - Check your belongings. How much of it says "Made in China"?

Re:PKB

[StevisF]

I don't really expect any level of ethical behavior from corporations. Corporations have two goals: increase the price of their stock and produce dividends for investors. To that end, they may accidentially or perhaps even intentionally act ethically, but it's certainly not to be expected. I do, however, expect the government to provide sufficient oversight of corporations.

I think what people are expressing is that the Congress should not expect ethical behavior from corporations when their actions have been ethically questionable and it's their job to regulate the corporations. Clearly in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, congress has allowed privacy and human rights to fall by the wayside worldwide.

Re:PKB

[smilindog2000]

Step 1: Congress makes it illegal to filter political content, or for any US corporation to aid in political sensorship'
Step 2: The bad guys close down their firewalls, but the US, EU, Canada, AU, etc, grow in prosperity and freedom through freedom of speech on the Internet
Step 3: China, Russia, North Korea, and Iran all try to emulate our success, and tear down their firewalls.

The importance of freedom of political speech on the Internet can't be understated. It's the future of the world at stake.

Re:PKB

[russotto]

The same Congress would be screaming if a foreign corporation refused to provide US authorities information on someone the US decided was a "person of interest".

Hmm

[fiannaFailMan]

I wonder will these politicians be as robust in their denunciation of China's human rights record the next time a Chinese trade delegation pays them a visit.

Re:Hmm

[Anonymous Coward]

And, why aren't they yelling at AT&T for providing information to the Executive branch on the online activities of US citizens without a warrant? Is this not exactly the same thing as what Yahoo! is being lambasted for, except Yahoo! was *following* the law, and AT&T (and others) were *breaking* it?

Morally you are pygmies? Look in the mirror...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yahoo's actions that resulted in the arrest and imprisonment of a Chinese dissident.

Yahoo complied with a request from the government of a country that is on friendly terms with the US government for an investigation that involved "state secrets".

Since the US government is taking the position that you have no privacy in your email, ever, and they can read it anytime without getting a warrant, let alone for "National Security" investigations, it's a bit ridiculous to expect US companies to have stricter standards in other countries.

Note that I'm not saying Yahoo is innocent, just that the congresscritters are being hypocritical.

Re:Morally you are pygmies? Look in the mirror...

[rhombic]

Shi Tao should be thankful he was a "potential dissident" in China rather than being a "potential terrorist" in the US; a finite (10yr) jail sentence versus an indefinite sentence & waterboarding.

I'm sure this is redundant already

[tsstahl]

but wouldn't they expect Yahoo! U.S. to rollover if presented for an information request on the basis of "national security"?

Yahoo! China has to follow the laws of that country, just as we expect Yahoo! U.S. to do so.

Maybe the U.S. Government should issue Letters of Marque to multi-national corporations...

I don't for a second condone what Yahoo! did on moral grounds. However, legally they acted as expected.

Re:Troll my ass

[MightyMartian]

Because he's not. If IBM can be raked over the coals for doing business with Nazis, then Yahoo, Google and Microsoft deserve no less. If De Beers can be raked over the coals for its role in the horrors of the African diamond trade, then Yahoo, Google and Microsoft deserve no less.

How precisely is Yahoo helping making China free by selling out dissidents? Explain precisely how Google is bringing freedom to the masses in China by censoring the Tiananmen Square incidents?

They are colluders, profiteers and immoral traitors to the societies in which they were created. Corporations exist as legal fictions in the industrialized world as a favor to their investors, but I see no reason that if those investors and those they put in positions of authority within the corporate entity decide to piss on the human rights that the industrialized world have taken since the Enlightenment to be inalieable that notions of legal fictions of personhood should stand. I think a consistent threat to strip corporations doing business in other parts of the world of their personhood, making directors and stockholders directly criminally and civily responsible for the actions of their foreign dummy companies would go a looong way. Let the cowards and villains in China's government persecute their own citizens, without the collusion of Western companies.

Make that the price of China doing business with the West.