Adam Berry/Getty Images
While the public and private efforts to urge the NSA to limit its surveillance tactics have erupted in droves since the June 2013 leaks regarding the National Security Agency’s data collection practices, none of them have seemingly resulted in any substantial change from the government. Indeed, President Obama’s January speech addressing the global concerns about the NSA’s activity left listeners doubtful that any actual overhaul of a program many believe to be an infringement on U.S. constitutional rights is in the future. And while various technology companies have come forth in small measures to ask for more transparency from the government, their efforts have not been very cohesive, until the launch of the Reform Government Surveillance project.
Google, AOL, Yahoo, Facebook, Microsoft, LinkedIn, and Twitter have formed a movement directed at formally petitioning the government to make significant changes to its surveillance practices. Including provisions such as limiting the actual information collected about user activity, creating a legal framework in which to collect any data whatsoever, and ultimately providing adequate transparency to users about what is being collected, the Reform Government Surveillance movement is an official banding-together of the U.S. most major technology companies who have consistently been trying to save face with users about what they have allowed to pass through their back doors to the government.
VISUAL CONTEXT: AMERICANS’ INITIAL REACTIONS TO NSA LEAKS
Source: Pew Center.
The project sponsored by these companies is occurring in conjunction with a digital petition launched on February 11 called “The Day We Fight Back“, which asks users to input email addresses or phone numbers, upon which they will be issued a stock statement to send to their local legislators asking for reform on the government’s surveillance tactics.
Susan Volinari, Vice President of Public Policy for Google, wrote a blog post concerning Google’s participation in the movement, and the specific wishes that Google and other companies bear for Congress to act:
The USA Freedom Act reflects some of the key recommendations made by the President’s Review Group on Intelligence Communications and Technologies as well as the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board. We support this legislation and we urge Congress to enact it into law. But there’s more that can be done as we consider appropriate reforms to government surveillance laws. Congress should update the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) to require governmental entities to obtain a warrant before they can compel online companies to disclose the content of users’ communications.
No doubt, with the power of tech bigwigs behind it, and the deep-seated furor of many in the U.S. over the NSA’s programs, the petition will require response from the government. Whether that response is anything more than another seemingly empty speech from Obama remains to be seen.
