Apple and Google Execs met in English mansion to secretly discuss government surveillance plans

An 18th-century Mansion in England hosted an unlikely meeting of spy chiefs from seven countries and representatives from tech giants the other day. According to The Intercept, the meeting at Ditchley Park occurred to discuss the main topics government surveillance and was a way for the countries go over the reluctance of Apple and Google permitting access to their confidential servers.

The three day conference was attended by spy chiefs in the CIA, GCHQ, Australia, Canada, France, Germany and Sweden and was chaired by former British MI6 spy chief Sir John Scarlett. Alongside the chiefs, additional notable attendees included senior policy and legal staff from Google, Apple and Vodafone plus a handful of academics and journalists. The presence the Chief on the British electronic surveillance agency Government Communications (or GCHQ), Robert Hannigan, was certainly interesting since he publicly accused the US tech giants for being “command-and-control networks of choice for terrorists and criminals”.

One attendee was veteran journalist Duncan Campbell – who's reported on British spy agencies for many decades – who said the presentation was a “remarkable” gathering that “would happen to be inconceivable without Snowden”. He added:

“Away from the fetid heat of political posturing and populist headlines, I heard some unexpected and surprising comments from senior intelligence voices, including that ‘cold winds of transparency’ had arrived and were here to stay.”

“Perhaps to many participants’ surprise, there was general agreement across broad divides of opinion that Snowden – love him or hate him – had changed the landscape; and that change towards transparency, or at least ‘translucency’ and providing more information about intelligence activities affecting privacy, was both overdue and necessary.”

Edward Snowden said British and American spies, as well as some of their allies, were liable for extensive Internet surveillance and since the revelations, Google along with other companies have begun enforcing their unique privacy policies. As a result from the revelations, requests from spy chiefs for co-operation and assistance are actually met with resistance however the meeting shows that co-operation may yet be considered a possibility.

The net neutrality movement has arguably been one in the hottest topics in technology within the last few year and it has wide-reaching ramifications for those. Co-operation between your giants could mean usage of all or several of information stored on the smartphone and considering that it was recently revealed the NSA planned to make use of Google’s Play Store to incorporate malware to suspects’ handsets, it’s clear that anything may be possible if co-operation will happen.

Apple and Google Execs met in English mansion to secretly discuss government surveillance plans 2015-05-24T11:30:00-07:00 Rating: 4.5 Diposkan Oleh: Unknown