Politics and Law

Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg reiterated Tuesday that the social network does not work directly with the National Security Agency or any other government agency to provide direct access to its servers.

"We don't work directly with the NSA or any other program in order to proactively give any user information to anyone," Zuckerberg told shareholders at the company's annual stockholder meeting. "No one has ever approached us to do anything like that, like what was reported...No agency has any direct access to our servers."

Zuckerberg was responding to recent reports about the … Read more

Eight U.S. senators today seized on leaks from the National Security Agency to call for an end to a "secret law" that governs how intelligence agencies electronically spy on Americans.

Secret laws may seem like Kafkaesque jurisprudence borrowed from Soviet Russia, but last week's leak of a secret court order revealed the Obama administration has a secret interpretation of the Patriot Act that allows it to vacuum up logs of all domestic phone calls on a daily basis.

"It is impossible for the American people to have an informed public debate about laws that are … Read more

Google today asked the U.S. government to lift a legal gag order and let it clear up speculation and erroneous reports about what information it's forced to turn over to the feds.

In an open letter to Attorney General Eric Holder and FBI Director Robert Mueller asking for "transparency," the Mountain View, Calif.-based company is effectively applying an unusual amount of public pressure to the Obama administration. President Obama has claimed to have "the most transparent administration in history," though critics have argued otherwise.

Google, Apple, Yahoo, Microsoft, Facebook, and other Internet companies … Read more

Incensed at revelations of U.S. government surveillance programs, Mozilla, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, the American Civil Liberties Union, Reddit, and others have launched an effort called StopWatching.Us to marshal opposition to the secret programs.

"The revelations about the National Security Agency's surveillance apparatus, if true, represent a stunning abuse of our basic rights," the site says. "We demand the U.S. Congress reveal the full extent of the NSA's spying programs."

The site includes a petition that people can sign and send electronically. Other participants in the initiative include the American Library … Read more

Edward Snowden, the 29-year old government contractor who took credit for disclosing a top-secret National Security Agency document, has become the target of condemnation by U.S. politicians and a leak investigation by federal police.

A day after The Guardian published a video featuring Snowden being interviewed in a Hong Kong hotel room and alleging NSA illegalities, the former Booz Allen Hamilton employee has emerged as probably an even more polarizing figure than Bradley Manning.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, head of the Senate Intelligence committee, said Monday that Snowden was guilty of "an act of treason." A Fox News … Read more

The person who revealed the National Security Agency's Internet surveillance program is a 29-year-old former technical assistant for the CIA named Edward Snowden, according to an interview published by The Guardian.

"I have no intention of hiding who I am because I know I have done nothing wrong," he told the newspaper, which said it was publishing Snowden's identity at his request.

"I understand that I will be made to suffer for my actions," he said in an interview from Hong Kong. But, he added, "I will be satisfied if the federation of … Read more

The stream of leaks revealing the U.S. National Security Agency's secrets carries on with the public outing of a powerful intelligence tracking tool.

In a fresh wave of documents obtained by The Guardian, the details of the NSA's data mining tool "Boundless Informant" are laid out for the world to see.

Whereas PRISM is involved in the collection of data, Boundless Informant focuses on organizing and indexing metadata. The tool categorizes communications records rather than the content of a message itself, such as a text message or phone call.

A leaked fact sheet (PDF) explains … Read more

In response to the furor over reports of a classified surveillance program called PRISM, the U.S. director of National Intelligence has released a statement saying PRISM-related activities are "lawful" and "fully debated and authorized by Congress" and has issued a fact sheet on PRISM that says the government doesn't simply scoop information from company servers.

"PRISM is not an undisclosed collection or data mining program," reads the fact sheet, which bears the letterhead of Director of National Intelligence James R. Clapper. "It is an internal government computer system used to facilitate … Read more

The Department of Justice has given the Federal Communications Commission the go-ahead to issue a decision on Softbank's proposed buyout of Sprint.

In a letter to the FCC on Friday (PDF), the department said the Justice Department -- including the FBI -- along with the Department of Homeland Security had no problem with the deal proceeding.

"The agencies have reviewed the information provided by the applicants and analyzed the measures undertaken by the applicants to address potential national security, law enforcement, and public safety issues, including supply chain issues," the letter said. "Based on this review, … Read more