14 DAY TRIAL // The Silicon Valley is putting pressure on the White House, so US President Barack Obama is set to meet with execs from a bunch of companies, including Google, Yahoo, Facebook, Microsoft and Apple, to name just a few.
Internet companies and telco giants are set to discuss the industry’s concerns with the National Security Agency’s surveillance practices during a Tuesday meeting, the Washington Post reports.
Eight companies have sent an open letter to the US government just recently, asking for the reform of the surveillance apparatus and demanding that all governments abide by basic human rights.
The meeting will be attended by Eric Schmidt (Google), Sheryl Sandberg (Facebook), Tim Cook (Apple), Dick Costolo (Twitter), Marissa Mayer (Yahoo), Brad Smith (Microsoft), Erika Rottenberg (LinkedIn), Mark Pincus (Zynga), Burke Norton (Salesforce), Drew Houston (Dropbox), Reed Hastings (Netflix), Chad Dickerson (Etsy), Brian Roberts (Comcast), Shervin Pinshevar (Sherpa Global) and Randal Stephenson (AT&T).
The administration has been reviewing the surveillance issues brought to light thanks to Edward Snowden’s leaked documents. It looks like the discussion topic will extend from NSA’s surveillance practices to the troubled online federal marketplace, the issues with Healthcare.gov and the way the government and the tech industry can boost economic growth.
However, given the current situation, it is expected that most of the discussion will be centered on the NSA scandal. After all, it was just a week ago that Google, Microsoft, Apple, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Yahoo and AOL were signing the open letter and launching a new website to express their desire for reform.
“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 letter reads.
The message mentions that in numerous countries, the balance has tipped too far in favor of the state and too far away from the rights of the individuals, which, like in the US, are marked in the Constitution. This, they say, undermines the freedoms cherished by everyone.