Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg says he's 'confused and frustrated' by Obama's surveillance tactics

Flickr CC By: Dylan Tweney

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg says he's 'confused and frustrated' by Obama's surveillance tactics
(Image credit: Flickr CC By: Dylan Tweney)

In an open letter posted on his Facebook profile, Mark Zuckerberg lashed out at President Obama over his administration's surveillance practices.

"To keep the internet strong, we need to keep it secure. That's why at Facebook we spend a lot of our energy making our services and the whole internet safer and more secure," wrote Facebook's founder and CEO. "We work together to create this secure environment and make our shared space even better for the world."

He went on to say he had even called Obama personally to vent his disappointment. "This is why I've been so confused and frustrated by the repeated reports of the behavior of the U.S. government. When our engineers work tirelessly to improve security, we imagine we're protecting you against criminals, not our own government."

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Read the rest of the letter on his Facebook page.

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Jordan Valinsky is the lead writer for Speed Reads. Before joining The Week, he wrote for New York Observer's tech blog, Betabeat, and tracked the intersection between popular culture and the internet for The Daily Dot. He graduated with a degree in online journalism from Ohio University.