[danso]

It's not out of faith in Google or Facebook, it's that they have put up a reasonably testable defense rather than what they could've done, which is to remain mostly silent. Moreover, the very size and complexity that most people distrust them for also means that their cooperation with any government function is going to involve a lot of moving parts...it's not likely to be the case that Zuckerberg can lie about something and be sure that those involved all stick to the script.

So given that, I think it's worthwhile to actually test their assertion (I.e. not rush to judgment) rather than patting ourselves on the back with the logical fallacies of:

* "Well, the reports about Facebook and Google must be true because it comes from a group that is itself evil and who I would normally not believe" (the enemy of my enemy is my friend)

* "Well, what else would you expect an obviously evil entity to say after being accused of evil acts?" (circular reasoning).

Again, it's not because Google and Facebook are poor disenfranchised groups that must be sympathized with, but because it feels a little dishonest to subject them to the same kind of inescapable logical trap that our government has used to go after and prosecute suspected enemies of the state

Just out of curiosity...can you really not imagine a less transparent corporation than either Google or Facebook?

[philwelch]

With PRISM, if the allegations were false, Facebook and Google would deny them, but if they were true, Facebook and Google would still deny them. So the denial carries no information in and of itself. Parsing the denial might bear some clues--for instance, all these companies use the same technicalities and talking points.

[danso]

What are the similar talking points? They both do strongly deny knowledge or participation in PRISM, but that's not really a talking point.

And I don't think it's an either-or situation: either it's the truth and they deny, or it's false and they deny. There's a third option: it's true, and they remain silent.

[shardling]

Also, is it such a crazy idea that Facebook, Google, etc. would get together and come up with their own talking points? That was my first reaction on seeing the similar statements -- that they're acting with a common purpose and agenda, but one that's their own, not the governments.

[philwelch]

Why would companies who aren't collaborating with the NSA suddenly start collaborating with each other to deny collaborating with the NSA? Wouldn't they issue their own denials in their own words?

[shardling]

I don't really understand your question. It seems like you're asking why several groups, under attack in the same way, might get together to defend themselves, but I'd have thought that self-evident so -- what are you saying?

[philwelch]

When you're issuing denials, you don't have to get together and figure out how to phrase your denials unless you're trying to hide something.