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Google, Apple, Facebook, Twitter, Microsoft, Yahoo Form Alliance Against NSA

Posted by samzenpus on from the team-up dept.

mrspoonsi writes "BBC reports: Leading global technology firms have called for 'wide-scale changes' to US government surveillance. Eight firms, Google, Apple, Facebook, Twitter, AOL, Microsoft, LinkedIn, and Yahoo, have formed an alliance called Reform Government Surveillance group. The group has written a letter to the US President and Congress arguing that current surveillance practice 'undermines the freedom' of people. It comes after recent leaks detailed the extent of surveillance programs. 'We understand that governments have a duty to protect their citizens. But this summer's revelations highlighted the urgent need to reform government surveillance practices worldwide,' the group said in an open letter published on its website."

63 of 293 comments (clear)

  1. Yeah by GroeFaZ · · Score: 5, Informative

    And if that fails, at least give us a standardized interface to share our data, for saving costs.

    --
    The grass is always greener on the other side of the light cone.
    1. Re:Yeah by Chris+Mattern · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Surprisingly enough, I think this may be fairly serious. The big US Internet business are becoming increasingly scared that the spectre of NSA mass data-gathering is going to shut them out of markets outside the US.

    2. Re:Yeah by TheGratefulNet · · Score: 4, Insightful

      question: do these companies care about US or THEIR PROFITS (due to people turning away from their free online services)?

      I'll give you one guess which of those it is.

      in fact, those companies KNEW about the spying (they were asked by the gov, many many times, to reveal info about their users) but only NOW do they *act* like they care about us.

      just an excuse to try to make themselves look good and stand along the side of citizens in what they perceive as an alignment.

      but its all bullshit. those companies do not care one whit about our privacy. they DO care about a mass exodus away from their services to offshore ones and the fact that 'the cloud' is now seen as something to be avoided.

      --

      --
      "It is now safe to switch off your computer."
    3. Re:Yeah by Nerdfest · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I'm amazed the foreign governments even consider ising an americal based OS (at any time really, but most certainly now) for anything that requires any level of security while also being internet connected. Really, the same goes for most software. It just seems like asking to be pwned.

    4. Re:Yeah by robinsonne · · Score: 4, Informative

      Of course they care about profits! In this instance though, it might just work to our advantage. These are companies with a LOT of money, and in politics money is far more important than than anything else. These companies actually have the money and clout to make anything at all change.

      You really think the voters have a chance to make their voices heard?

    5. Re:Yeah by gmuslera · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Is a bit different than that. They are complaining now because the revelation of this is making their paid users to stop using their services. They may or may not be worried about their users privacy, but for sure they are worried about their profits.

      In the other hand, tif well they knew the cut of the cake they were getting, they didn't know about all the other companies into the same and how wide and deep were this. Also, the revelation on how the NSA infiltrated their internal network without their knowledge or consent could had raised some alarms.

      In any case, if the NSA head can lie to the congress without consequences after that being found out, why can't they tell all of them that it is over while keep doing it (and keeping the backdoors in their internal networks to keep doing the dirty work) or force them in a way or another to tell the world that all is over when is not, or even plant a fake whiteblower that confirms that the NSA stopped their programs ? By now trust is deeply broken in all that surrounds the NSA, if tomorrow they say that 2+2=4 you should bet that they are doing math in base 3.

    6. Re:Yeah by JDG1980 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      question: do these companies care about US or THEIR PROFITS (due to people turning away from their free online services)?

      Of course they are primarily concerned about their profits (especially about the potential loss of business from non-US customers, who under current NSA doctrine apparently have no right to privacy at all). But in this case, the companies are right on the merits. Their interests and the interests of the general public are, on this particular issue, aligned.

      Civil liberties battles are hard enough under the best of circumstances. You take your allies where you can find them.

    7. Re:Yeah by sharknado · · Score: 2

      I see this on a daily basis. My company is offering a SaaS version of our software on Amazon EC2, and we're frequently being asked for a hosting alternative outside of the US. The funny thing is, most of the time it's US organizations asking for the overseas hosting.

    8. Re:Yeah by TheGratefulNet · · Score: 4, Informative

      no, I won't 'take my allies where I can find them'. they can too easily shift back to being against me. they are NOT my alies, just enemies of my enemy. haven't you been paying attention the last, say, 20 years or so?

      --

      --
      "It is now safe to switch off your computer."
    9. Re:Yeah by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Linux is always an alternative.

    10. Re:Yeah by shutdown+-p+now · · Score: 2

      "Enemy of my enemy" worked to win the WW2. Just saying.

      In this particular case, you're not required to do anything to support the corporations in question. On the other hand, if, say, you're writing your Congressman to demand some action about NSA, attaching a copy of this letter will help you make your case.

    11. Re:Yeah by ausekilis · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Linux is always an alternative.

      Not if the publisher of a particular business-critical application refuses to make it work in Wine, or the manufacturer of a particular business-critical peripheral refuses to provide a Linux driver.

      If that publisher sees incentive (i.e. money) or disincentive (i.e. loss of money), they'll play ball. There are Point of Sale systems that work on top of Linux, some medical systems work on Linux, even your cell phone is likely to be based on Linux (Android). I can all but guarantee that if a government body or a sufficiently large corporation say "we love this, but need it to work on that", you'll see motion in that direction. Look at Valve's push to Linux. It's not a blowaway success, but it's certainly stirring things up.

    12. Re:Yeah by bmajik · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I think Snowden changed the game on this

      Before the Snowden revelation, it wasn't widely accepted that the government was reading everything anybody ever wrote. For _one_ of these companies to come forward to complain was like the prisoners dilemma. There was no guarantee that other players would follow suit, so for GOOG to come out and say "The NSA is spying on you and we can't stop them" puts GOOG at a competitive disadvantage. Furthermore, all of this stuff was secret; not to be disclosed publicly, etc. Companies weren't sure how much teeth there were in those rules, so were further hesitant to talk much about it.

      Post Snowden, its all different. Now its an open secret that this happens, and it happens to everyone. Now there's no posturing or competitive advantage to be exploited; everyone is in the same boat. This is a populist issue and once one company made noise about sticking it to the NSA, the rest were going to have to follow.

      The other thing that has changed is that Snowden and Lavabit have both gone public. The public has spoken. We now have proof of what kind of stuff the Feds will do and how far they'll go to keep it quiet. The people who leaked this stuff survived.

      The government might be able to sue Yahoo or Lavabit or any of them individually, but it cannot sue the entire tech industry.. not right now.

      --
      My opinions are my own, and do not necessarily represent those of my employer.
    13. Re:Yeah by Plumpaquatsch · · Score: 2

      Linux is always an alternative.

      That's what the NSA wants you to believe.

      --
      Of course news about a fake are Fake News.
  2. Will they leave the USA? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    What's their nuclear option? What's their post-nuclear strategy? It's doubtful the NSA is going to change their ways.

    1. Re:Will they leave the USA? by whoever57 · · Score: 2

      What's their nuclear option? What's their post-nuclear strategy? It's doubtful the NSA is going to change their ways.

      In addition to being spied upon by the NSA, these companies must receive thousands of subpoenas for information. They could be a little less responsive to each one of these in many ways (while still remaining within the law). It would not impact the NSA, but would impact the government.

      --
      The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
  3. What about looing in the mirror? by beatle42 · · Score: 2

    While I'm sure the talk about the NSA being able to listen in on their customers will be bad for business, I wonder what they'll do if people start to really take online privacy seriously. That would really cut to the core of their businesses, so perhaps they're really trying to clamp down on it before people start to think about it even more than they already have been.

  4. It's like the hyenas criticising the lions by rizole · · Score: 5, Insightful

    current surveillance practice 'undermines the freedom' of people.

    1. Re:It's like the hyenas criticising the lions by Baloroth · · Score: 5, Insightful

      current surveillance practice 'undermines the freedom' of people.

      I can choose not to use Google (yes, I can even choose to disable their trackers on websites, like, say Slashdot). I can't choose not to have the NSA snoop on email. So it's more like the merchants criticizing the taxmen. One will happily take your freedoms if you give it to them, the other will take your freedoms willing or not.

      --
      "None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license." --John Milton
  5. "undermines the freedom" of people by mrspoonsi · · Score: 5, Insightful

    They really mean "undermines our companies bottom line".

    Google is happy to collect all the information it can get its hands on (and get away with), I am sure the others are equally as complicit.

    1. Re:"undermines the freedom" of people by Nerdfest · · Score: 5, Insightful

      There's a big difference between volunteering your information and having it scooped up by a government agency that has already shown that it will use the information to blackmail you.

  6. Re:congrats guys and gals by i+kan+reed · · Score: 5, Insightful

    thank you for releasing a press statement claiming that you are standing up, in a way that mollifies those concerned about their privacy, while lacking any substantive evidence of resistance

    American corporations, and these 5, in particular, have shown a history of not minding deceitful marketing in the slightest. I feel no compelling reason to trust them.

  7. Damage Control Mode - ON. Well, fuck 'em all by rodrigoandrade · · Score: 5, Interesting

    This is nothing but a PR stunt by these firms to save face, since they all happily collaborated with NSA's dirty practices in exchange of dough and political favors.

    I say fuck 'em all!!

    1. Re:Damage Control Mode - ON. Well, fuck 'em all by wickerprints · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Policy-wise, nothing really gets done in the US without the implicit consent of corporate power. This applies even to things like spying. The government is run by the wealthy elite and therefore the policies are designed to favor their interests. Where those interests may conflict, it is usually the entity with the greater influence or better connections that gets their way.

      This latter point is where we stand with regard to warrantless domestic surveillance of US citizens by the NSA. The eight companies that have "allied" against this practice, albeit influential as a group, have been for the most part self-interested competitors, and many of them make no attempt to hide the fact that they run a business model that is predicated upon mining personal data from its users in order to sell advertising (Google and Facebook being the most notable examples).

      However, that is not to say that they actively or "happily" collaborated with the NSA. The legal requirements, as far as we have been apprised of them, force their cooperation. It is not logical to assume that just because their business involves exploiting their users, that they would not object to NSA surveillance, because the latter does have a deleterious effect on the former. If users suddenly feel paranoid because they think these companies are (willingly or unwillingly) handing over their personal information to the government, then they would be more reluctant to share that data by posting it online. The fear of surveillance brings about increased awareness of the need for protecting one's privacy, which of course is NOT what these companies want. That is the essential argument behind their opposition.

      In any case, these companies are merely the repositories for end-user information. The real culprits here, the ones who ARE happily handing over information to the government, are the telecommunications companies, notably AT&T. They are the ones who let the NSA install listening devices on their networks. And you will note that these companies have NOT banded together to protest this illegal surveillance program. They don't see any need to, because they have too much power (since the entire internet is reliant on them) and, unlike Google and Facebook, they have no incentive to protect the data that flows through their networks. If a subscriber doesn't want to share personal information about themselves to a social network, they can opt out of doing so, and the result is a loss of valuable data for the company that operates that network. But it is MUCH harder to completely forgo the internet entirely, which is what you would have to do in order to avoid having AT&T send your data to the NSA. And AT&T doesn't make their money off selling your personal information to advertisers. They make it off your basic need for connectivity.

  8. Re:congrats guys and gals by Virtucon · · Score: 5, Informative

    Their statement should read "You're fucking up our business model and shareholder equity, stop copying us!"

    --
    Harrison's Postulate - "For every action there is an equal and opposite criticism"
  9. PR stunt by hochl · · Score: 4, Informative

    They will encrypt all their traffic and hard drives but leave open the surveillance API on their running servers to access the data. Or they will share the encryption keys. "All data will be encrypted to protect customers" is nothing more but a PR stunt!

  10. But nothing, corporations under your control by SuperKendall · · Score: 5, Informative

    Where is the alliance to prevent Google, Apple, Facebook, Twitter, Microsoft, and Yahoo (and Amazon) from invading our privacy...

    That's in your power. Don't use them, or use them in ways you know they can't track you (disable flash/cookies etc).

    It's still a VASTLY better situation than the government, which you cannot opt out of. You cannot realistically not use a phone; you cannot realistically connect to the internet at all and not be at risk of the NSA breaking into your system unwanted.

    At least what companies DO is transparent. Anyone can see what the websites are sending/receiving, and you know when you are visiting or making use of them. The same is never true of the government.

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
    1. Re:But nothing, corporations under your control by AthanasiusKircher · · Score: 2

      Where is the alliance to prevent Google, Apple, Facebook, Twitter, Microsoft, and Yahoo (and Amazon) from invading our privacy...

      At least what companies DO is transparent. Anyone can see what the websites are sending/receiving

      Yeah, I agree that it's better than the government, but I wouldn't exactly call big business tracking on the internet "transparent."

      Sure, you can run all sorts of browser plug-ins to control scripts, 3rd-party requests, cookies of various types, etc., etc., but most of this is invisible to the average user. I'd say greater than 95% of internet users have no freakin' idea that a single website visit might trigger dozens of cookies, dozens of requests to various other sites, etc.

      Yes, most people understand there's some tracking going on, but unless they install some browser plug-ins or something, they generally have no idea of the scale of what's going on.

      Not all of this is the fault of these companies, of course. Part of the fault is in browser design, and choices browsers make for default privacy settings.

      But some of it *IS* the fault of big companies, too. I've noticed an increasing dependence on cookies, unnecessary 3rd-party scripts, etc. in recent years just to get basic functionality out of some websites. Even if you're running a basic plug-in like NoScript and a cookie manager, you'll find yourself increasingly authorizing more things just to get a website to work. While some of this has to do with web design issues, I've definitely noticed more situations where websites deliberately decrease functionality periodically to force a user to enable scripts and cookies that allow tracking.

      But I only see that because I actually want to see what's going on "behind the scenes" in my browser. For most people, all of this is completely invisible.

      And let's not even get started on the crazy nonsense from companies like Facebook, who say they are committed to user privacy but yet periodically would change everyone's privacy defaults to have things wide open. Unless you pay attention to your Facebook notifications and privacy settings in great detail, or read blogs concerned with such things, your standard relatively private settings in your account would gradually have opened up to more and more people.

      Are these companies better than secret government spying initiatives? Sure, I guess. But "transparent"? Hardly.

  11. Privacy from the Govt. not US! by Daemonik · · Score: 2

    Not one of those companies gives a damn about your privacy. They all collect and data-mine more information about you than the NSA does, it's why the NSA tapped them to begin with. They are only doing this to a) prevent or at least minimize foreign countries using the privacy scandal to fund competition against them; b) prevent or at least minimize foreign countries from penalizing them legally; and c) for the slight bit of positive marketing with people who believe they care.

  12. i say: put your money where your mouth is. by ClassicASP · · Score: 5, Interesting

    We probably won't hear a word about these folks in public TV due to well orchestrated govt control, which makes it less obvious to the public. I say: all seven of these should stand together united with the same message and video on their homepages. That'll force their way into public television networks.

    1. Re:i say: put your money where your mouth is. by jonnythan · · Score: 2

      I dunno about TV, but I learned about this because it was a front-page story on the New York Times. It's not like the mainstream press isn't covering this.

  13. what bullshit! by Connie_Lingus · · Score: 3, Interesting

    why, in heaven's name, would ANYONE believe this nonsense after all the lying that these corps. and agencies have been stuffing up our butts?

    talk about astroturf on a grand scale...more like astroturd.

    --
    never bring a twinkie to a food fight.
    1. Re:what bullshit! by TheGratefulNet · · Score: 3, Interesting

      one good thing to come from the NSA scandal is that people are finally realizing they can't trust:

      - the government (the data collectors and manipulators, at least)

      - big business

      and in a way, its a KIND of progress! its a start. to at least admit there is a problem, that's good progress.

      however, step 2 is a bit harder to accomplish...

      --

      --
      "It is now safe to switch off your computer."
  14. Sounds Legit... by They'reComingToTakeM · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Messrs Pot, Pot, Pot, Pot, Pot, Pot, Pot, & Pot - Meet Agent Black.

    1. Re:Sounds Legit... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      Wouldn't they be meeting agent kettle?

  15. That's our job by careysb · · Score: 5, Informative

    How dare you collect and analyze personal data on our clients! That's our job!

  16. Give up our security? by MonkeyDancer · · Score: 3, Funny

    Are they nuts? My Senator says "these tools are required to intercept and obstruct terrorism". He goes on to say that "we must never allow the terrorists to alter the freedoms that define our country and make us the greatest nation in the world". If we stop these programs then the terrorists win!

  17. AOL by simpz · · Score: 3, Insightful

    "Eight leading Internet firms, Google, Apple, Facebook, Twitter, AOL, Microsoft, LinkedIn, and Yahoo, have formed an alliance called Reform Government Surveillance group."

    As someone else pointed out "Seven leading Internet firms" and AOL

    Who's still using AOL , or is still paying for it and actually uses their service. I'm sure I read somewhere that a large percentage of their users are unaware that they no longer needed their AOL subscription to get online via broadband?

  18. Just government surveillance, huh? by Jupix · · Score: 2

    Google, Apple, Facebook, Twitter, AOL, Microsoft, LinkedIn, and Yahoo, have formed an alliance called Reform Government Surveillance group.

    "Government surveillance"? At least the NSA isn't reading my stuff to figure out how to best sell me things...

    So what about corporate surveillance? I'm a lot more worried about the snooping being done in this group of corporations.

    Actually, clearly I'm not very worried about that either, since I keep using Windows, Google, Facebook etc.

  19. Re:congrats guys and gals by tsa · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Indeed, they want the NSA to just buy the information it needs from them.

    --

    -- Cheers!

  20. Re:congrats guys and gals by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    At least they are doing something. What have YOU done?

  21. Re:congrats guys and gals by brianwski · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Isn't posting on my Facebook wall the same as actually doing something?

  22. He who votes decides nothing by Gothmolly · · Score: 3, Insightful

    He who COUNTS the votes decides everything. Good luck guys. Let us know how it works out for you.

    --
    I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
  23. Re:congrats guys and gals by Desler · · Score: 5, Insightful

    All they are doing is try to protect themselves and their businesses. They could give a shit less about the people being spied on. If they had really cared they would have done this years ago not simply when the egg splatted on their faces.

  24. Re:congrats guys and gals by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    So what? I don't give a shit what they are doing so long as they can get some kind of results. If I had to choose who was spying on me, I'd rather it be a company than a government. Companies can't misconstrue something that you said, send you to a prison camp and torture you.

  25. Rights to provide details by sl4shd0rk · · Score: 2

    FTFA: "rights to provide details of any such future data requests to their users"

    This is the only substance in TFA talking about what they "alliance" wants. All that means to me is there will be another EULA full of word-spin everyone will simply click through because it's bullshit.

    Until there is a service where you physically posses your encryption key, this is all the same clear-text data laying on disk, wrapped in SSL when it's moving. Still subject to eveasdropping.

    --
    Join the Slashcott! Feb 10 thru Feb 17!
  26. Re:congrats guys and gals by Curunir_wolf · · Score: 3, Informative

    At least they are doing something. What have YOU done?

    Cancelled my accounts on Google, Apple, Facebook, Twitter, Microsoft and Yahoo.

    --
    "Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
    --- Jerry Garcia
  27. Re:congrats guys and gals by poetmatt · · Score: 2

    5? How do you get "these 5" from 8?

    I do agree that this isn't significant at all, but all of them are american corporations and three of the 8 have been pretty honest with their marketing.

  28. Re:congrats guys and gals by Tanktalus · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Until this got leaked out into the public sphere, they were gagged by the same surveillance orders. They couldn't say anything without admitting they were served with secret subpoenas. Now that this is public knowledge, they can refer to those that were leaked and say this is bad for business/citizens without breaking the law on any further subpoenas.

    So, maybe they didn't care. Or maybe they did and just couldn't say anything about it due to the same evil law. From this vantage point, we still can't tell for sure.

  29. Re:congrats guys and gals by stackOVFL · · Score: 2

    At least they are doing something. What have YOU done?

    I haven't bought a XBox or any other Microsoft product, I have not subscribed to Cox VOIP, I also don't have a Facebook page, twittter account or any other related infosite account. I wont buy a PS4 or a new phone, tablet or anything else until this spy / fear mongering crap stops. The only item I have not gotten rid of is gmail. For IMHO they are all the same. Even if you run you own POP server they can get the data. But we'll see maybe I'm just not being clever enough. I realized the gov does not listen to me (I tried but they just said they don't agree with me). But I also realized who the gov will listen too: businesses whose customer base is telling "I don't trust you so I wont buy your product" So, I voted with my "information" (it's as good as cash these days) and cash as well. I'm sure a whole lot of other folks did too. Some of them even post on this site!

  30. Re:congrats guys and gals by Desler · · Score: 2

    The NSLs don't become null-and-boid because of the leaks. This pure PR damage control and nothing more.

  31. Re:congrats guys and gals by Desler · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The "so what" is that they would have never done anything had there been no PR disaster. They would have continued to gladly give taps on their customer's data. Ignorants like yourself will believe this stunt is some genuine backlash when it's simply so they can save face and continue yo give over the data anyway.

  32. Re:congrats guys and gals by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Their statement should read "You're fucking up our business model and shareholder equity, stop copying us!"

    And what would be wrong with that? The NSA is doing significant economic harm to the only sector of the US economy that's still growing, and it's doing so without a commensurate increase in the physical security of the 300,000,000 US citizens it claims to be protecting.

    Unless NSA can demonstrate that the value of the industrial espionage it conducts exceeds the value it destroys due to customers fleeing US-based IT businesses (and I'm fine with that debate taking place behind closed doors), it needs to seriously consider renouncing its misguided and economically harmful surveillance programmes.

  33. Re:congrats guys and gals by Charliemopps · · Score: 5, Insightful

    American corporations, and these 5, in particular, have shown a history of not minding deceitful marketing in the slightest. I feel no compelling reason to trust them.

    As well you shouldn't. But don't look a gift horse in the mouth. This is capitalism at work... our government doing the wrong thing has hurt their bottom line, so they are using their financial and political muscle to get change. This is a good thing. I, like you, doubt they are acting out of pure good will, but I'll take what I can get.

    2ndly, Google having my personal data is a bad thing, I agree... but it's orders of magnitude less dangerous than the government having that same data. At most, Google can annoy me with spam, hurt my credit rating, or use psychology to trick me into buying something I otherwise wouldn't have. The government on the other hand can imprison me, force me to implicate friends, blackmail me, or even torture and kill me. Lets work on the securing the serial killer in the room before we worry about the shady used car salesman.

  34. Re:congrats guys and gals by phantomfive · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The NSA does buy it from them.

    Now they are possibly just using the outrage to negotiate a higher price.

    --
    "First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
  35. Great PR by Zamphatta · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Fantastic PR here, but I'll wait and see if anything really comes of it. Sorry to say, I'm very skeptical that this is anything more than good press for these companies. At best, I think it's got very little to do with the 'freedom of the people' and a whole lot to do with the companies fear that the people aren't trusting them anymore. That hits the wallet. I'm sure that group of tech companies has enough cash to throw at Washington to get something done if they want to, but I'm not sure they want to. So like I said, I'll wait and see if anything really comes of this before I get my hopes up.

  36. Re:congrats guys and gals by interkin3tic · · Score: 3, Interesting

    No, I think they also want the NSA to keep it a secret this time, as people finding out about it causes headaches.

  37. Re:congrats guys and gals by lgw · · Score: 2

    Intentions never matter. Results always matter. All the chatter and groupthink on /. is that the big corporations really run the government. Well, these big corporations want to change how the government is run, in a way that benefits us. I wish them the best of luck.

    --
    Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
  38. Buy stock in popcorn by meta-monkey · · Score: 2

    Oh look, the corporations I don't like are fighting the government I don't like. It's like Christmas had sex with my birthday!

    --
    We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
  39. Re:congrats guys and gals by Curunir_wolf · · Score: 2

    He no longer needs to pay for the Internet, so he's saving lots of money!... but how did he post?!

    Thank you for pointing out the biggest problem with the Internet today - people think if the don't have an agreement with one of the big Internet corporations, and use their services, that there is nothing to use the Internet for. I assure you, this is incorrect. And we'd all be a lot better off if more people would realize that.

    Just because you don't shop at Walmart or Target doesn't mean there's nowhere to go shopping.

    --
    "Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
    --- Jerry Garcia
  40. Re:congrats guys and gals by Branciforte · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I work at Google.

    Before anything was reported by Snowden, plans were already in place to protect user data. It started with the switch to HTTPS, continued with us encrypting user data on disk, and we were beginning to encrypt data that was transferred between datacenters. The revelation that the NSA was tapping into undersea cables only accelerated the timeline.

  41. Still an empty gesture, though. by MtViewGuy · · Score: 2

    Here's the problem: the REAL people that should be standing up to NSA snooping are the Level 1 Internet backbone providers: AT&T, Level 3, Sprint and Verizon. Because the NSA directly tapped into the backbone, the spy agency don't need access to the servers at AOL, Apple, Facebook, Google, LinkedIn, Microsoft and Yahoo! to get all the information they need. Indeed, I've read that NSA already has special rooms inside AT&T and Verizon operations to directly tap into the backbone--and this known for many years.

  42. SPREAD IT AROUND by AndyCanfield · · Score: 2

    The NSA intrusion is already affecting U.S. business. My e-mail is at Yandex.com, which answers to the KGB, not the NSA. I use IxQuick, not Google. My web site is in Thailand. Any company today who creates a web site hosted in the USA is just stupid. There are perfectly competant hosting services outside the NSA's backyard.

    I sent an e-mail supporting these eight companies regarding their hopes to limit the Feddie spooks. Yes, of course it is stockholder's equity that is being destroyed. But that makes it no less sincere. If the US can't hold back the NSA then NOBODY will use Google.com. Of course, it is ironic that Google's whole business plan is to know eveything about you. I don't want ANYBODY to know everything about me; I stopped using Google a year before Edward Snowden.

    Ahah! There was that name! "Edward Snowden". This post will make it to the bowels of the NSA database. Creepy?

    The weird part is that this problem was solved over two hundred years ago. It's called a "search warrant". You want to read my e-mails, go get a search warrant. Otherwise, keep your fingers out of my stuff.