While EFF has long had concerns about the ability of multistakeholder groups like GNI to take sufficiently prompt and forthright stances with regard to global privacy, freedom of expression and security concerns, the recent NSA revelations have demonstrated that there is a much deeper problem. It has become clear that affected companies are unable even to talk about secret orders they have received from the US government. We know that the same is true for other governments around the world. Documents publicized in the last few weeks related to NSA surveillance have highlighted just how dramatic government interference with Internet companies’ security practices has been.

As a result, EFF longer no believes we can sign our name onto joint statements that rely on shared knowledge of the secur ity of company products or their internal processes.