U.S. President Barack Obama is set to sit down with top executives of Silicon Valley companies, Tuesday, Dec 17, to talk about several issues, including the conroversial surveillance programs of the National Security Agency (NSA), impacts of unauthorized intelligence disclosures, and the problematic HealthCare.gov website.
Obama will be meeting with several top executives such as Apple's Tim Cook, Google's Eric Schmidt, Yahoo's Marissa Mayer, Comcast's Brian Roberts, and at least 11 more top executives of the biggest names in the technology industry.
"...President Obama will meet with executives from leading tech companies to discuss progress made in addressing performance and capacity issues with HealthCare.Gov and how government can better deliver IT to maximize innovation, efficiency and customer service," an official from the White House was quoted by TIME. "The meeting will also address national security and the economic impacts of unauthorized intelligence disclosures. Finally, the President will discuss ways his Administration can partner with the tech sector to further grow the economy, create jobs and address issues around income inequality and social mobility."
The meeting with the technology giants comes a week after a coalition that consists of AOL, Apple, Facebook, Google, LinkedIn, Microsoft, Twitter, and Yahoo posted an open letter pressing the U.S. government and other governments in the world to enact reforms that will help protect free expression and privacy of citizens.
The tech companies posted their letter on reformgovernmentsurveillance.com and called for governments to have a sensible limitation to collect users' information, have a clear legal framework for checks and balances for intelligence activities, transparency on government demands, free flow of information, and a framework to avoid conflicts between governments.
Coincidentally, Tuesday's meeting also takes place after a U.S. District Court judge ruled that the surveillance program of the NSA is unconstitutional.
"I have little doubt that the author of our Constitution, James Madison, who cautioned us to beware 'the abridgment of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments by those in power,' would be aghast," said Judge Richard Leon.
The administration is also seeking help to improve the insurance marketplace for the Obamacare program. The website has been problematic from the start with software bugs and hardware issues. According to reports, the government implemented enhancements at the start of the month to address technical issues and make the website available for majority of users.
