And I am not arguing with your perspective, I am sure that many do not.
But I don’t see what that has to do with you wanting us to believe that leaders have any interest in using their companies as a force to protect consumer interests.
I do see little benefits here and there where the alternative might affect their share prices but on the whole you are asking us to believe something that does not match the actions.
My friends that work at various levels of Microsoft, Google, Facebook, Amazon etc are all great. I do not believe that their companies are always acting in the benefit of us, which should not be a controversial position.
Perhaps it would be better to speak less overbroadly.
I’m not sure “consumer interests” was a starting point anywhere in this thread unless by “consumer interests” you mean “civil rights of folks who use their services under a Trump NSA.”
Knowing people who work in Google security, especially Chrome, I expect they are actively discussing what they can do to minimize attack surface (and actually Google has been doing that for years). That said, if a company’s revenue is in advertising, they’re going to keep some consumer information. Otherwise, they have nothing to sell. Microsoft, for all of its willing cooperation with Law Enforcement historically, has had a very clear policy around privacy and protections for more than a decade and, even a decade ago, spent a LOT of time discussing how to protect user data while still retaining what they needed for their own work and goals. People that don’t work in privacy or focus on it as a hobby often miss how much work some of these companies ACTUALLY do.
Really, people need to put actions where their mouths are as consumers. If you don’t like Facebook or Google and what they do, quit using them!!! Seriously. That sends a message.
Sure thing, boss. You go tell your COO or CEO (or better yet, the VCs funding your start-up) that you “won’t let them” use the code you write to do naughty things, and see how fast your “irreplaceable” butt is on the sidewalk with a box of your desk toys.
