Evgeny Morozov Quotes

I'd rather deal with a big company, because at least I can sue them, and see them, and know what they're doing. Google, for instance, shows you everything they've collected on you, with a clearly written privacy policy. They tell you what they're doing with it. I'm not scared by that.

The Federal Reserve, like other central banks, wields powerful tools; democratic accountability requires that the public be able to see how and for what purposes those tools are being used.

It isn't citizens, or Congress, who decide how our information network regulates itself. We don't get to decide how information companies collect data, and we don't get to decide how transparent they should be. The tech companies do that all by themselves.

There is so much we don't know about Facebook. We know we have a corporate monopoly that has repeated serious violations that are threatening our democracy.

Edward Snowden, who worked for Booz Allen Hamilton, professes to have had access to whatever he wanted to know about anyone's anything. If he's telling the truth, why does he have such permeability without any government oversight? Is that OK with you?

It's my father's legacy. My father's view was that the public is the employer of these government employees and has the right to know what they're up to.

There is no longer any anonymity on the Web - unless we mandate it. The most personal information about your online habits is collected, bought and sold, often instantaneously and invisibly. Data collection is a business driven by profits at consumers' expense.

Ever since I arrived in Washington in April 2009, I have been fighting for more transparency and accountability in government.

Competition leads both drug companies and private regulators to be trustworthy. If they are not trustworthy, they die.

A key purpose of journalism is to provide an adversarial check on those who wield the greatest power by shining a light on what they do in the dark, and informing the public about those acts.

Even in non-democratic countries, people have a legitimate interest in knowing about actions taken by the government.

Whatever Tencent can see, the Chinese government can see.

Only the corporation that shirks from the light would have anything to fear from government. About the welfare of such corporations we need not be over-sensitive.

From the right to know will flow the right to demand, and get, tougher laws and safer practices.

I do not dread these corporations as instruments of power to destroy this country, because there are a thousand agencies which can regulate, restrain and control them.

Governments are elected by people; corporations are not. Governments that must answer to the people; corporations must answer only to their boards.

The importance of supervising the business of great railways and industrial combinations and the necessary investigation and prosecution of unlawful business methods are another necessary tax upon Government which did not exist half a century ago.

How much we all suffer from lack of oversight from the government.

We will continue to hold accountable financial institutions that, in the pursuit of their own financial interests, misuse public funds and cause harm to hard working Americans.

They’re everywhere, and it’s not a mistake. These are private companies building private algorithms for private ends.... Algorithms were built by private companies and sold to the government institutions. They call it their “secret sauce” — that’s why they can’t tell us about it. It’s also private power. They are profiting for wielding the authority of the inscrutable.

I'm all in favor of the FTC investigating companies when it believes there is proper cause to do so. An investigation, however, can lead to political pressure to bring a case, even if such a case is unwarranted.

Every few years, the feds and the courts change direction or fail to answer important questions. And every day, the Internet becomes more of a platform for lousy ads, for increasing the power of a few rich companies, and for intrusive tracking. It's too important to leave unprotected.

Apple chief executive Tim Cook is such a respected figure that it's easy to overlook the basic problem with his argument about encryption: Cook is asserting that a private company and the interests of its customers should prevail over the public's interest as expressed by our courts.

If the air quality is terrible in Los Angeles, if a particular university is unusually expensive, if crime is on the rise in Dallas, or if a company has a lot of recalled toys, transparency can spur change. Whenever public or private institutions have to answer to the public, their performance is likely to improve.

Whistleblowers play a vital role in ensuring that the federal government is accountable to the people it serves.