NSA Surveillance May Cost U.S. Tech Companies More than $35 Billion

[Ichingcarpenter]

Two years ago, when Edward Snowden exposed the NSA’s massive surveillance machine it didn’t just make Americans distrust the U.S. government—it also impelled foreigners to shy away from U.S.-made technologies. The result appears to be costly. In fact, a new report from the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF), a Washington, D.C., think tank, says the agency’s pervasive digital surveillance will likely cost U.S. companies more than $35 billion in foreign business by 2016.

The report says Snowden’s revelations about surveillance and subsequent reports about government spying have caused the U.S. tech industry to underperform. It also says that U.S. policymakers made things worse by advocating for weaker information security practices instead of moving to quell consumers’ fears.

“The economic impact of U.S. surveillance practices will likely far exceed ITIF’s initial $35 billion estimate,” the report says. “Foreign companies have seized on these controversial policies to convince their customers that keeping data at home is safer than sending it abroad, and foreign governments have pointed to U.S. surveillance as justification for protectionist policies that require data to be kept within their borders.”

http://www.newsweek.com/nsa-surveillance-may-cost-us-tech-companies-more-35-billion-341168

[Cryptoad]

1. Just another example of how Comrade Snowden screwed over his country!

[Ichingcarpenter]

2. The Nsa destroyed this nation's constitution and tech industries

no matter how you try to spin it.

[shawn703]

5. Wrong

The reckless release of information concerning our techniques and technologies for conducting foreign surveillance is what caused this damage. The NSA intercepting network switches en route to Russia or China to install backdoors or other malware to gain access to their secure networks was not anything those countries needed to know about. Thanks to Snowden and Greenwald, this and other important programs are a lot less useful than they used to be.

[shawn703]

3. This is what he needs to pay for

Our foreign surveillance operations are vital to our security interests, and have been since the beginning of our nation. Other countries, their military, their companies, and their citizens do not have any Constitutional protections, and if they are involved in plots against us, I for one want our intelligence agencies to know about it. This set us back in a big way, and shows how this was something way worse than whistleblowing, no matter how much Snowden supporters try to spin it.

[bemildred]

4. It will cost them a lot more than that before this is done. nt