Oscar Williams-Grut / via Yahoo News / Nov. 4, 2019

Edward Snowden urged tech companies to challenge the practice of widespread data collection by corporations in a speech on Monday, saying not enough progress has been made since he blew the whistle on the National Security Agency’s (NSA) data scrapping in 2013.

Speaking via video link at the opening of the Web Summit conference in Lisbon, Snowden said: “Whether we’re talking about Facebook or the NSA, that is the real problem — we have legalised the abuse of the person through the personal. We have entrenched a system that makes the population vulnerable for the benefit of the privileged.

“What do you do when the most powerful institutions in society have become the least accountable to society? I think that’s the question that our exists generation to answer.”

‘People are mad at the right people for the wrong reasons’

Former CIA contractor Snowden leaked huge tranches of data in 2013 that uncovered widespread data collection by the NSA and other global intelligence services. The leaks highlighted the often indiscriminate collection of data on global populations, much of it collected in concert with global tech companies.

Continue reading here: Edward Snowden: 'It is not data that is being exploited, it’s people'