Today published an open letter signed by the heads of leading IT-companies in the U.S., addressed to President Barack Obama and members of Congress.
In his message to industry leaders need to review legislation on surveillance to action intelligence services do not undermine people's confidence in the new technology.
"We understand that the obligation of governments - to protect citizens. But the revelations made by this summer, emphasized the urgent need to reform the surveillance programs conducted by states around the world, "- said in an open letter, which was signed by the heads of AOL, Apple, Facebook, Google, LinkedIn, Microsoft, Twitter, Yahoo.
Executives fear that the surveillance program will undermine user confidence in information technology. "People will not use the technology, they do not trust - results publication words Brad Smith, executive vice president of Microsoft. - Government put that trust in jeopardy, and they also need to help restore it. "
Recall that in late October, the Washington Post reported that the U.S. National Security Agency secretly connect to the server Yahoo and Google. On this edition we learned from documents published by Edward Snowden.
The authors argue that the NSA copies "whole data streams of fiber-optic networks that transmit information between data centers giants of Silicon Valley." According to a document dated 9 January 2013, resulting Edward Snowden, headquarters offices in Fort Meade daily receives millions of files from the metadata (information about the sender, recipient and date of departure emails) to texts and e-mail attachments.
According to the authors, 30 days before the publication of the report into the database NSA received more than 181.2 million units of such data. NSA Head Gen. Keith Alexander refuted newspaper Washington Post. "That's not true - he said during a speech at a conference on cyber security in Washington. - We are not embedded in any database. It is illegal. "
At the same time, General Alexander confirmed that Google and Yahoo really cooperate with the NSA, which is engaged in tracking information on terrorists and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.
However, Internet companies are doing it by the decision of the Special Court, and such cooperation corresponds to U.S. law. The Minister added that this practice exists in other countries.
