Dear Senators and Representatives:
I recent read the following:
The U.S. Congress Tuesday asked Yahoo Inc. to explain alleged false statements the company’s attorney gave in testimony last year.
The House Foreign Affairs Committee said that Michael Callahan, Yahoo’s senior vice president and general counsel, testified last year that Yahoo didn’t know why the Chinese government asked the company for personal information about Shi Tao, a pro-democracy advocate. China has since imprisoned Shi for 10 years.
The House committee is asking both Callahan and Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang to appear at a hearing November 6 to explain how it gave the alleged false information during the earlier testimony. In a statement, Committee Chairman Tom Lantos said Congress wants to hold the company accountable for its actions and examine the steps Yahoo has taken to protect the privacy rights of users in China.
Despite Callahan’s testimony, the committee said that Yahoo had in its possession a Chinese government document that left little doubt as to that government’s intentions.
Shi was arrested after posting information about a government crackdown on an overseas Web site using a pseudonym. Beijing police tracked him down based on the information Yahoo provided them with, the committee said.
While, undoubtedly, lying to Congress is a serious charge, that charge seems minor compared to the hypocrisy of your investigation. It seems that you, Congress, are very concerned about the privacy rights of the Chinese.
However, you are the U.S. Congress. Why do you not worry about the privacy rights of Americans? You are actually considering offering the U.S. companies who provided the NSA with contractually private information immunity for complying with George Bush’s quest to find out everything about all Americans. Yahoo! is no worse that AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth. The Chinese government is no worse than the Bush administration. Why are you not calling AT&T, Verizon and BellSouth before your esteemed committees to ask why they divulged private customer information? You are facing the same set of circumstances in both instances – however, you choose to investigate the possible trampling of Chinese privacy rights while you let the privacy rights of Americans be bought, sold and controlled on a whim.
Shame on you. If you intend to put Yahoo! through the ringer on this, I expect to see an immediate annoucement that you will be investigating the companies named above and that you will deny immunity to any of the companies which cooperated with the Bush administration. I mean, it’s only fair. It might also be nice to see you put Americans’s interests above foreign residents’s interests.
Your prompt compliance with my request is appreciated.
