© The GuardianAOL, Twitter, Yahoo, Microsoft, Facebook, Google, Apple and LinkedIn say: 'The balance in many countries has tipped too far in favour of the state and away from the rights of the individual'.
The world's leading technology companies have united to demand sweeping changes to U.S. surveillance laws, urging an international ban on bulk collection of data to help preserve the public's "trust in the internet".
In their most concerted response yet to disclosures by the National Security Agency whistleblower Edward Snowden, Apple, Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Yahoo, LinkedIn, Twitter and AOL
have published an open letter to Barack Obama and Congress on Monday, throwing their weight behind radical reforms already proposed by Washington politicians.
"The balance in many countries has tipped too far in favour of the state and away from the rights of the individual - rights that are enshrined in our constitution," urges the letter signed by the eight US-based internet giants. "This undermines the freedoms we all cherish. It's time for change."
Several of the companies claim the revelations have shaken public faith in the internet and blamed spy agencies for the resulting threat to their business interests. "People won't use technology they don't trust," said Brad Smith, Microsoft's general counsel. "Governments have put this trust at risk, and governments need to help restore it."
The chief executive of Yahoo, Marissa Mayer, said: "Recent revelations about government surveillance activities have shaken the trust of our users, and it is time for the United States government to act to restore the confidence of citizens around the world."
Comment: The aforementioned report is trying hard, but unsuccessfully, to give credence to the unlawful infiltration of online gaming by military intelligence, whose actual purpose seems to be spying, the collection of data from the private lives of American citizens and their recruitment as cannon fodder or informants. IF there is any group out there plotting against the US empire, they must have better communication means than hiding behind a fantasy-creature avatar and trying to get their message through the busy battlegrounds of online gaming.
So, with the above in mind, it makes one wonder what kind of a "leak" this was, since it agrees with the propaganda agenda of our times.
Read also: U.S. and UK military intelligence 'planted agents' into World of Warcraft, Second Life to spy on gamers