Google is putting its support behind the USA Freedom Act

In a recent AMA on Reddit, a bunch of Google executives voiced their support for yesterday’s ruling by the federal appeals court which said that the NSA’s bulk collection of telephone records wasn’t legal. The executives also voiced their support for the new USA Freedom Act, which they described as a “serious step toward real surveillance reform.”

Several Google executives held a question and answer session on Reddit today to address (and avoid) a variety of different topics. Perhaps most notably, the Google executives voiced their support for the federal appeals court ruling on Thursday that said bulk collection of telephone records by the NSA is not lawful. Google’s director for law enforcement and information security Richard Salgado, along with senior privacy policy counsel David Lieber, applauded the ruling and noted that Google strongly opposes giving the NSA power to mass collect telephone records. The two executives then voiced support for a bill currently pending in Congress that would allow the NSA to collect data only on a case-by-case basis. The bill, known as the USA Freedom Act, was called a “serious step toward real surveillance reform” by the two executives.