Tech execs urge Obama to rein in U.S. government's electronic spying

Tech execs urge Obama to rein in U.S. government's electronic spying

Fat chance of that - it's the only growth area in the American economy at the moment.... peoples liberty doesn't rank alongside profits ....

Lulz, Obama is the man that approves of the spying. And they want him to end it. Problem is people still believe this man is some kind of well intentioned honest and reasonable statesmen and some kind of rare honest politician. When in fact he is the total opposite.

I'm still interested how anyone can justify the paranoia over the sheer amount of data that is being collected. It's the equivalent of an Everest size mountain of poop falling on the NSA every 24 hours and expecting them to find the odd undigested sweetcorn.

There is simply is no way they can deal with that many communications, even for legitimate anti-terror info...

@madverts, perhaps at the moment, but ALL DATA is being collected, even that which you have self-edited(keystroke data) from whatever social media you use, and all can potentially become evidence against you in the not-so-distant future, including that Celine Dion song you downloaded after watching Titanic a decade ago.

Good for them Jean, I'm still not sure what you think such information can be used against you, even if it was a kick-start, two-stroke, gasoline powered dildo that you might have happened to purchased from an online sex shop in years gone by.

Even if they manage to store it all, how on earth do you thing they can handle or even use any of the unimaginable amounts of information gathered against you?

Sorry, but you appear more paranoid than the NSA themselves. Get worried about Google and the likes, they are the one's acting with virtually no oversight that you should be worried about....

Word had it the NSA is developing a pair of glasses with a tiny camera that can record everything you look at. It can even take your picture with a casual wink of an eye. Wait, no, that's Google.

The NSA is also scanning each and every email written for keywords that their computers can analyze and.....wait, no, that's Microsoft and Google.

The military is developing drones that will fly over your head and can even land right at your doorstep, dropping off.....wait, no, that's Amazon.

Jean: ALL DATA is being collected, even that which you have self-edited(keystroke data)

The government will track your edited status updates and....wait, no, that's Facebook you're talking about.

Ever make a phone call? Your metadata is being collected by the gov....wait, no, that's Verizon.

The government can track your every move if you have a mobile phone by....wait, no, that's one of a dozen apps you've already put on your phone.

What these companies are saying is that they don't want the government to have access to data they they themselves are collecting. They're going to make this a huge issue because they want people to think about the government's actions and not their own. It turns the issue from "the government wants your keystroke data" as opposed to "the government wants access to our keystroke data." And in terms of Congressional oversight, these companies have none of it.

SuperLib has made the unfortunate but true point that we subject ourselves to all manner of breaches of privacy voluntarily - just by posting here, too. I think the issue is that Amazon and Verizon can't put us in jail, deny us access to air travel, or even affect our ability to find a job based on the information they collect. Then again, there is more use by hiring companies to check credit scores, social media, etc. before they make an offer....

The ability of software to troll data for key phrases or to check a pattern of web site hits and key phrases or any number of permutations is practically unlimited any more. Memory capacity has become much less expensive in the past 20 years and computing power is way up. Buying patterns and web searches are monitored just so you can be bombarded with adverts. It's not a big leap to see the government tracking all sorts of information for any reason they care to.

To sum up, Amazon may have the power to suggest, government has the power to coerce. That's a big difference.

If you look at the transcripts of the meeting, Obama avoided discussing the issue, and instead spent most of the meeting talking about how his administration is working on the technical "glitches" with the Obamacare site.

Only three more years to go...