[governance] FW: [Ottawadissenters] Snowden and US tech companies

[Suresh Ramasubramanian]

As for the bolded text in the first paragraph, about companies spending billions of dollars to open international data centers, may I just point out that, for compliance reasons related to export of PII/SPI, and network performance reasons, companies worldwide have been rolling out local data centers in each country that they do a significant volume of business?

This is a standard practice from years before the snowden revelations, so while I appreciate the article, it needs at least a few reality checks here and there.

--srs (iPad)

> On 21-Mar-2014, at 23:03, "michael gurstein" <gurstein at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> Fascinating… It is only in the area of Internet Governance that there seems to be an unquestioned trust in the actions and motivations of relevant “stakeholders” and particularly the USG and the major US Internet corporations. I wonder why, and particularly for Civil Society who in other spheres is rather more critical and skeptical?
>  
> M
>  
> From: Ottawadissenters at yahoogroups.com [mailto:Ottawadissenters at yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Arthur Cordell
> Sent: Friday, March 21, 2014 10:20 AM
> To: Ottawadissenters at yahoogroups.com; futurework at vancouvercommunity.net
> Subject: [Ottawadissenters] Snowden and US tech companies
>  
>  
> Revelations of N.S.A. Spying Cost U.S. Tech Companies
> by Claire Cain Miller NYTimes
> March 21, 2014
> •
> SAN FRANCISCO — Microsoft has lost customers, including the government of Brazil.
> IBM is spending more than a billion dollars to build data centers overseas to reassure foreign customers that their information is safe from prying eyes in the United States government.
> And tech companies abroad, from Europe to South America, say they are gaining customers that are shunning United States providers, suspicious because of the revelations by Edward J. Snowden that tied these providers to the National Security Agency’s vast surveillance program.
> Even as Washington grapples with the diplomatic and political fallout of Mr. Snowden’s leaks, the more urgent issue, companies and analysts say, is economic. Tech executives, including Eric E. Schmidt of Google and Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook, are expected to raise the issue when they return to the White House on Friday for a meeting with President Obama.
> It is impossible to see now the full economic ramifications of the spying disclosures— in part because most companies are locked in multiyear contracts — but the pieces are beginning to add up as businesses question the trustworthiness of American technology products.
> Meanwhile, the confirmation hearing last week for the new N.S.A. chief, the video appearance of Mr. Snowden at a technology conference in Texas and the drip of new details about government spying have kept attention focused on an issue that many tech executives have hoped would go away.
> Despite the tech companies’ assertions that they provide information on their customers only when required under law — and not knowingly through a back door — the perception that they enabled the spying program has lingered.
> “It’s clear to every single tech company that this is affecting their bottom line,” said Daniel Castro, a senior analyst at the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, who predicted that the United States cloud computing industry could lose $35 billion by 2016.
> Forrester Research, a technology research firm, said the losses could be as high as $180 billion, or 25 percent of industry revenue, based on t
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