Right now the biggest story is regarding our phone calls and if the government is watching and listening to our every move. It all started with the news that the National Security Association had secretly ordered Verizon to hand over all their call logs. Then it got crazier when it was reported that a government agency called PRISM has free access into a slew of internet companies such as Google, Facebook, YouTube and others.
Well Google CEO Larry Page along with Google Chief Legal Officer David Drummond took to the official Google Blog to make a statement and to tell us the truth. The blog post clearly states that Google not only has nothing to do with PRISM, but they never even heard of the agency until yesterday.
“First, we have not joined any program that would give the U.S. government—or any other government—direct access to our servers. Indeed, the U.S. government does not have direct access or a “back door” to the information stored in our data centers. We had not heard of a program called PRISM until yesterday.”
They went on to say that they only provide user data to governments based on the law. Each request is reviewed by the legal team and many times they will push back a request if it’s too broad or it doesn’t follow the correct process.
“Press reports that suggest that Google is providing open-ended access to our users’ data are false, period. Until this week’s reports, we had never heard of the broad type of order that Verizon received—an order that appears to have required them to hand over millions of users’ call records. We were very surprised to learn that such broad orders exist. Any suggestion that Google is disclosing information about our users’ Internet activity on such a scale is completely false. “
They closed by talking about the need for a more transparent approach. Google was the first company to post statistics about the data requests they receive on their own site.
“And, of course, we understand that the U.S. and other governments need to take action to protect their citizens’ safety—including sometimes by using surveillance. But the level of secrecy around the current legal procedures undermines the freedoms we all cherish.”
So what do you guys think about this fiasco? I personally could care less if anyone is looking at my call log. I am just one person among millions, and if these types of actions make us all safer, than it’s fine with me. However, I do think that doing something like this in secret is wrong and should be shared. Let us know what your thoughts are.
sources: Official Google Blog / Google Transparency Report
Come comment on this article: Larry Page confirms that the U.S Government doesn’t have direct access to Google servers
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