Does the law really restrict what Google can do? Check their privacy policies again. Or those of Microsoft, or Sony. As a condition of using the service at all I'm required to choose to give up those privacy rights.
And either way, according to the EFF a portion of the FISA used to support PRISM and subpoenaing Verizon's records was ruled unconstitutional and here they are doing it anyways.
So certainly there should be legal safeguards, and those need to have the force of law (instead of policy) where those safeguards must survive a change of Administration. But let's not kid ourselves about what the law really prevents, either in practice or in that worst case that civil liberties advocates always mention.
I believe it does, yes. At least the law is public and you therefore know what the rules of the game are in the case of corporations and can hold them to it or point out infractions.
With the NSA there is no public law governing their activities (or at least no law that they seem to respect, as you note).
Comments
Does the law really restrict what Google can do? Check their privacy policies again. Or those of Microsoft, or Sony. As a condition of using the service at all I'm required to choose to give up those privacy rights.
And either way, according to the EFF a portion of the FISA used to support PRISM and subpoenaing Verizon's records was ruled unconstitutional and here they are doing it anyways.
So certainly there should be legal safeguards, and those need to have the force of law (instead of policy) where those safeguards must survive a change of Administration. But let's not kid ourselves about what the law really prevents, either in practice or in that worst case that civil liberties advocates always mention.
Does the law really restrict what Google can do?
I believe it does, yes. At least the law is public and you therefore know what the rules of the game are in the case of corporations and can hold them to it or point out infractions.
With the NSA there is no public law governing their activities (or at least no law that they seem to respect, as you note).