The technology industry has had it a bit rough when it comes to user privacy, with concerned consumers raising voices on how their data is used and tracked. Now with NSA and PRISM in the spotlight, add spying to the list.
But now the technology industry wants more accountability from the US government. Several large US companies have individually urged the Obama administration to make public all user data requests made in this regard. Now these have co-signed a letter asking the same.
Mozilla is joined with several other groups and 22 companies, as they come together asking for some basic transparency from the government — Microsoft, Google, Facebook, Yahoo are all in.
The companies are asking for the right to reveal just how many requests of these sorts they get, and what they cover. Mozilla, already one of the driving forces behind the StopWatching.Us campaign has published a letter, with Obama getting a copy of it as well.
The organization explained:
“Mozilla is joining with over 60 leading technology companies, startups, investors, technology trade groups and public interest groups today to call on the US government to allow the release of information pertaining to national security requests for user data.”
You can take a look at the letter here (PDF file), and the requests being made are perfectly straightforward and standard at this point. They are in fact, the same ones that Google, Microsoft and several others made individually the past few weeks.
Here is hoping, the US government allows these companies to disclose the number of requests for data they receive from the agencies, and how many users are targeted.
