Congressional Commitee Rips Yahoo Execs

A number of readers sent word of the hearing by the US House Foreign Affairs Committee in which committee members raked two Yahoo execs over the coals. "While technologically and financially you are giants, morally you are pygmies," the committee chairman Tom Lantos, D-Calif., said angrily after hearing from Jerry Yang and Michael Callahan about Yahoo's actions that resulted in the arrest and imprisonment of a Chinese dissident. In 2004 Yahoo turned over information about journalist Shi Tao's online activities requested by Chinese authorities. In Feb. 2006, Yahoo's General Counsel Callahan testified that he had not known the nature of the investigation the authorities were conducting. He later learned that several employees of Yahoo China were aware at the time that the investigation involved "state secrets," but Callahan did not go back to Congress to amend his testimony. Committee members were withering in their disdain for Yahoo's refusal to help Shi Tao's family after his arrest.

PKB

[mastershake_phd (1050150)]

Isn't that like the pot calling the kettle black?

Re:PKB

[Elemenope (905108)]

No, it's more like the howitzer calling the derringer a gun.

Re:

[iminplaya (723125)]

Yeah, the little bitty Derringer. What could it possibly do [uiuc.edu]?

Re:

[Starayo (989319)]

Flip the four and two and you get 24, EXACTLY twice the number of apostles at the last supper!!1!

Think about it.

Re:

[entropiccanuck (854472)]

Yes, but it's so much easier, never mind more comfortable, to lambast the flaws in others than recognize and correct your own failings.

Re:

[rtyhurst (460717)]

From the article:

"Shi Tao was sent to jail for 10 years for engaging in pro-democracy efforts deemed subversive after Yahoo turned over information about his online activities requested by Chinese authorities."

Guy gets 10 years for *having an opinion*?

What happened to "YRO"?

What's the Chinese government going to do if Yahoo! doesn't roll over and rat out Shi Tao?

Put the website in jail?

What a bunch of belly-crawling cowards...

There's no excuse for this.

Re:

[calebt3 (1098475)]

Step 1. Yahoo refuses to cooperate w/Chinese authorities.
Step 2. Yahoo get blocked by the Great Firewall of China Step 3. ???? Step 4. No Profit from advertisements.

Re:PKB

[smilindog2000 (907665)]

Step 1: Congress makes it illegal to filter political content, or for any US corporation to aid in political sensorship'
Step 2: The bad guys close down their firewalls, but the US, EU, Canada, AU, etc, grow in prosperity and freedom through freedom of speech on the Internet
Step 3: China, Russia, North Korea, and Iran all try to emulate our success, and tear down their firewalls.

The importance of freedom of political speech on the Internet can't be understated. It's the future of the world at stake.

Re:PKB

[cheater512 (783349)]

Step 1: Congress makes it illegal to filter political content, or for any US corporation to aid in political sensorship except content relating to the US government

There fixed it for you.

Re:

[Associate (317603)]

Shouldn't there be a Pot/Kettle tag?

Re:PKB

[pclminion (145572)]

Enough of the fucking "pot-kettle-black" shit. Do the failings of the US Congress make the actions of Yahoo any less reprehensible? No? Then shut up.

Re:PKB

[joebagodonuts (561066)]

Oh please. This isn't about the reprehensibility of Yahoo's actions. This is about Congress being hypocritical. Neither party gives a hoot about the journalist getting jailed.

The irony here is that Yahoo's simply following the leadership that our elected leaders demonstrate. If our leaders have a problem with what's going on, they might want to look at how they are leading this nation, rather than hold disingenuous hearings.

So - the kettle/pot comments are appropriate considering the subject matter. And before you go much further condemning Yahoo - Check your belongings. How much of it says "Made in China"?

Re:PKB

[russotto (537200)]

The same Congress would be screaming if a foreign corporation refused to provide US authorities information on someone the US decided was a "person of interest".

Re:PKB

[StevisF (218566)]

I don't really expect any level of ethical behavior from corporations. Corporations have two goals: increase the price of their stock and produce dividends for investors. To that end, they may accidentially or perhaps even intentionally act ethically, but it's certainly not to be expected. I do, however, expect the government to provide sufficient oversight of corporations.

I think what people are expressing is that the Congress should not expect ethical behavior from corporations when their actions have been ethically questionable and it's their job to regulate the corporations. Clearly in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, congress has allowed privacy and human rights to fall by the wayside worldwide.

Re:PKB

[The Analog Kid (565327)]

Tu quoque [wikipedia.org]

Just because a congressman might be hypocritical, doesn't make their arguments any less valid.

Re:PKB

[Elemenope (905108)]

Actually, it can. This is not a logical syllogism situated in the abstract we are talking about, but rather an issue in which Congress no less than Yahoo! (and probably much more) has a role to play. If a Congressman upbraids a corporation for undertaking acts that are morally repugnant, did that Congressman also introduce or vote for legislation that would make such a stance a practical option for that corporation? Did congress rattle sabers over protecting Yahoo! China's executives if they were to defy Chinese law to aid the dissident? Threaten trade sanctions? Place restrictions on how and in what manner Yahoo!'s international subsidiaries can aid foreign governments? Any of those would have aided Yahoo! in making such a choice palatable to its board of directors and its shareholders, and given cover if Yahoo!'s executives wished to do the "moral" thing.

If Congress had in its power the substantive means to encourage Yahoo! to do the moral thing or at least give it legal cover to do so, and failed to so act, Yahoo! can indeed say "you too, asshole" and not be staking out a morally vacuous position. It might also help if Congress wasn't green-lighting retroactive immunity for similar crimes domestically; one might argue from that that Congress has shown it doesn't so much care about the rule of law when it comes to corporations complicit with government orders.

ad hominem tu quoque is not automatically a fallacious argument if the agent so identified is culpable in the very same matter (and not a merely equivalent matter) as the subject.

Re:Lantos Sucks

[kpainter (901021)]

Yeah, but I hear if you drop a Lantos into Diet Coke, it foams furiously.

Re:PKB

[anagama (611277)]

Don't worry. Give us two more decades in the US and we'll be as free as China.

Hmm

[fiannaFailMan (702447)]

I wonder will these politicians be as robust in their denunciation of China's human rights record the next time a Chinese trade delegation pays them a visit.

Re:

[by Anonymous Coward]

Indeed .. isn't Yahoo's only obligation to increase shareholder value within the constraints of the laws of the countries in which it does business ?

Yahoo is not required to apply any 'moral' standards - whose morals should they use ? ... Yahoo management's morals ? ... shareholder's morals ? ... politician's morals ? ...

Re:Hmm

[MightyMartian (840721)]

So if that's the beginning and end of corporate responsibility, then clearly IBM was quite right to help the Nazis exterminate Jews, Gypsies and other undesirables. Good to know that corporations doing business abroad shouldn't be held to any level of basic responsibility for human rights and human dignity, and should be nothing more than money making machines directing funds for any ol' human abusing shit hole to Western investors.

Bring on the blood diamonds! Who the fuck cares who gets abused! Money is the only thing worth consideration.

Re:Hmm

[MightyMartian (840721)]

I'm not saying the US is right. But tell me, do you think it was right that IBM was selling Hollerith machines to the Nazis? Sure, the Chinese government, by and large, isn't killing people using Western technologies, but it's using them for it's Great Firewall, and it's demanding that companies whose head offices are in the US collude with them in oppression. If De Beers can be taken to task for fueling the blood diamond trade in Africa, then I think Yahoo has to answer for its actions. Why should we care about Yahoo's shareholders any more than Yahoo's shareholders care about Chinese dissidents?

Re:Hmm

[metlin (258108)]

How about upholding basic human rights [un.org] as put forward in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights [wikipedia.org] charter of the UN?

Would that work for you, Mr. Philosopher, because you seem more interested in the moral relativism of something rather than the fact that it violates some fundamental precepts of human dignity?

Re:Hmm

[lelitsch (31136)]

OK, given that China is a communist dictatorship, wouldn't it be great if you and the US Congress would get cracking on:

Article 5. [Gitmo, Abu Ghraib, and the highest percentage of people in prison and on death row except for China]

            No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

Article 8. [Gitmo]

            Everyone has the right to an effective remedy by the competent national tribunals for acts violating the fundamental rights granted him by the constitution or by law.

Article 9. [Gitmo]

            No one shall be subjected to arbitrary arrest, detention or exile.

Article 10. [Gitmo]

            Everyone is entitled in full equality to a fair and public hearing by an independent and impartial tribunal, in the determination of his rights and obligations and of any criminal charge against him.

Article 12. [Warrantless wire tapping, and the nice comments about email we just heard from the FBI]

            No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks.

Article 13. [No, you don't have a right to a passport in the US]

            (2) Everyone has the right to leave any country, including his own, and to return to his country.

Article 21. [at least 2 million convicted felons are prohibited from voting, even after they finish their sentence]

            (1) Everyone has the right to take part in the government of his country, directly or through freely chosen representatives.

Now I am not implying that the US--the country I chose to live in--is even close to China/North Korea/etc in oppression, but what happened to REPUBLICAN values?

I've spoken of the shining city all my political life, but I don't know if I ever quite communicated what I saw when I said it. But in my mind it was a tall proud city built on rocks stronger than oceans, wind-swept, God-blessed, and teeming with people of all kinds living in harmony and peace, a city with free ports that hummed with commerce and creativity, and if there had to be city walls, the walls had doors and the doors were open to anyone with the will and the heart to get here. That's how I saw it and see it still.

Ronald Reagan, Farewell Address to the Nation
Oval Office
January 11, 1989

Re:

[metlin (258108)]

I'm not saying that some of the things that the US is doing is right, but that neither obliviates nor excuses China's actions.

How do the sins of this country in any way have a bearing on respecting basic human rights elsewhere?

Re:

[TheoMurpse (729043)]

Technically speaking the UDHR is a non-binding document and therefore doesn't really mean much. But I'm of the mind that the UDHR is one of the most important documents that mankind has ever produced. Now if we could only get countries to follow it (my own included).

Re:

[GoofyBoy (44399)]

>isn't Yahoo's only obligation to increase shareholder value within the constraints of the laws of the countries in which it does business ?

Even if you take this extreme, then Yahoo! still did the wrong action.

This whole hearing is bad for Yahoo!; weak management who didn't have the full story on something this big, bad publicity in non-China far-east Asia, bad publicity in the tech community around the world, potential new legal regulations in their home country, management has to spend time on this who

Re:Hmm

[kithrup (778358)]

So we should make it illegal for Yahoo! to do in China what we make it illegal for them to not do here?

While I agree that the Chinese government is very much not nice, the same Congress that is chastising -- and threatening punishment -- Yahoo! executives is the same Congress that allowed damned near any government employee to demand the same information about any Yahoo! customer, in the United States, without a warrant, and prohibiting Yahoo! from telling anyone about it.

Every government in the world may operate by "Do what we say, not what we do," but it's still sickening to hear someone complaining about how awful it was that a Chinese citizen was imprisoned and tortured, yet know that that same someone has refused to do anything to stop American citizens from being imprisoned and tortured.

Human rights are for everyone, not just for foreigners.

Re:Hmm

[by Anonymous Coward]

And, why aren't they yelling at AT&T for providing information to the Executive branch on the online activities of US citizens without a warrant? Is this not exactly the same thing as what Yahoo! is being lambasted for, except Yahoo! was *following* the law, and AT&T (and others) were *breaking* it?

Re:Hmm

[iminplaya (723125)]

Is this not exactly the same thing as what Yahoo! is being lambasted for, except Yahoo! was *following* the law, and AT&T (and others) were *breaking* it?

It's quite simple really. If you're "with us", you're not breaking the law(when the president does it, it's not illegal). If you're "against us", you are.

Morally you are pygmies? Look in the mirror...

[by Anonymous Coward]

Yahoo's actions that resulted in the arrest and imprisonment of a Chinese dissident.

Yahoo complied with a request from the government of a country that is on friendly terms with the US government for an investigation that involved "state secrets".

Since the US government is taking the position that you have no privacy in your email, ever, and they can read it anytime without getting a warrant, let alone for "National Security" investigations, it's a bit ridiculous to expect US companies to have stricter standards in other countries.

Note that I'm not saying Yahoo is innocent, just that the congresscritters are being hypocritical.

Re:Morally you are pygmies? Look in the mirror...

[rhombic (140326)]

Shi Tao should be thankful he was a "potential dissident" in China rather than being a "potential terrorist" in the US; a finite (10yr) jail sentence versus an indefinite sentence & waterboarding.

Doesn't Yahoo know ...

[Hmmm2000 (1146723)]

What happens in China, stays in China?

Bad Yahoo, good AT&T

[WasterDave (20047)]

Right, so Yahoo are bad for grassing up the online activities of a Chinese dissident to their government, but AT&T are good for spying on Americans for their government. This, presumably, is because the US government has a squeaky clean human rights record.

Aha. OK. You can put me on your list now.

Dave

oooh, having a politician calling you names

[petes_PoV (912422)]

With their net worth, I doubt if they're the slightest bit concerned about being called any names under the sun.

For a politican to call them "moral pygmies" must've been hard to keep a straight face and not burst out laughing.

pathetic

Good ol' Tom Lantos

[seaturnip (1068078)]

From Wikipedia [wikipedia.org]:

During a 1996 Congressional inquiry into the "Filegate" scandal, Rep. Lantos told witness Craig Livingstone that "with an infinitely more distinguished public record than yours, Admiral Boorda committed suicide when he may have committed a minor mistake." Boorda, the Chief of Naval Operations, had recently taken his own life after his right to wear Combat V decorations had been questioned. Lantos was criticized by some (including fellow Congressman Joe Scarborough) who interpreted the remark as a suggestion that Livingstone too should kill himself.

On May 3, 2000, Lantos was involved in an automobile accident while driving on Capitol Hill. Lantos drove over a young boy's foot and then failed to stop his vehicle. He was later fined over the incident for inattentive driving.

In June 2007, Lantos called former German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder a political prostitute.

In October 2007, Lantos insulted Dutch parliament members, while discussing the War on Terrorism by stating that the Netherlands had to help the United States, because they liberated them in the Second World War, whilst adding that the upheaval over Guantanamo in Europe was bigger than over Auschwitz at the time.

I'm sure this is redundant already

[tsstahl (812393)]

but wouldn't they expect Yahoo! U.S. to rollover if presented for an information request on the basis of "national security"?

Yahoo! China has to follow the laws of that country, just as we expect Yahoo! U.S. to do so.

Maybe the U.S. Government should issue Letters of Marque to multi-national corporations...

I don't for a second condone what Yahoo! did on moral grounds. However, legally they acted as expected.

Re:

[vertinox (846076)]

Yahoo! China has to follow the laws of that country, just as we expect Yahoo! U.S. to do so.

What if the law in the US says you cannot follow the law in China?

There are plenty of laws that US citizens are supposed to follow while overseas even though the activity may be quite legal in the country they are dealing with. Mostly tax and sedition laws... But I suppose if they really wanted to, US congress could pass a law to outlaw doing business with people who don't respect human rights or democracy. Oh wait..

Re:I'm sure this is redundant already

[trolltalk.com (1108067)]

"What if the law in the US says you cannot follow the law in China?"

... and what if China then passes a law saying you cannot follow US law?

Sovereignty means the country establishes the rules within their boundaries. If the US doesn't like it, they can always go to war with China. It will be the quickest war ever - China immediately dumps their vast US currency holdings on the open market, the US dollar becomes (even more) worthless within 1 minute due to programmed trading, etc.

China and Japan (and pretty much the rest of the world) are already looking to divest themselves of their reserves of US dollars, since Barneke has made it clear that he will destroy the dollar's value in a stupid attempt to delay the consequences of the collapsed housing bubble as long as possible, which will only make it worse when the time of reconning arrives,

The USD is no longer a "reserve currency". This has broad implications for the US' ability to "project force", and its loss of superpower status.

Re:

[trolltalk.com (1108067)]

Last stats I saw were net ouflows of $69 billion in one month. That's a lot of investment "pulling up stakes."

If push comes to shove, why should China not use all the levers it has - including the "dump the dollar" nuke option - if the US keeps acting stupid wrt either currency or politics?

BTW - the US economy has had real double-digit inflation for the last 5 years. Taking the three things that people actually spend money on all the time - food, energy, and mortgages - out of the index is just as bad

Re:

[trolltalk.com (1108067)]

You can't keep running a "War on Terror" if you're broke. The US is dependent upon foreign lenders. And like the old saying goes, the debtor is slave to the lender.

China [census.gov] - on track to beat last year's 232 billion dollar deficit.

Japan [census.gov] - another 80 or 90 billion

OPEC [census.gov] - add 110 billion this year (or more likely 130 billion)

Oh, what the heck - lets just do the WHOLE DARNED WORLD [census.gov] Another $800 Billion Dollar trade deficit this year. The US consumer's credit card is maxed out.

all of the pygmies i have known

[circletimessquare (444983)]

were morally and ethically upstanding

Frackin hypocrites

[davidsyes (765062)]

But, it's ok to rake through the private email of US citizens WITHOUT a warrant. I think the haggle over warrants is just a ruse, one to MAKE us think that the government (various agencies, that is) are OBEYING the law.

Secret Gnomes

[headkase (533448)]

The better the state is established, the fainter is humanity. To make the individual uncomfortable, that is my task. -- Nietzsche

I love Slashdots almost prescient ability to provide a fortune that bears on the topic. The US is going into the toilet, Bush's war needs to be paid for and that money is going to be coming from US' citizens children for quite some time to come. The government of the US exists within a moral vacuum, nobody asks if something is "right" they just ask if its "legal". From the Patriot Act denying first ammendment rights (you can't tell anyone - even your lawyer or a judge - if you've been served under that act effectively cutting due process out of the loop) to what is torture, waterboarding. I think they should all be lined up against a wall and shot. This would be satisfying but would not likely result in any improvements so something else must be done. The only thing I can think of that has any hope of leading us out of the quagmire is demanding full transparency out of government. So, no "secret" subpeonas, no "secret" detentions, no "secret" trials, no "secret" interrogation techniques, no secrets because thats where evil hides.

Fuck Bush. I think he's leading a great nation into ruin.

Troll my ass

[moderatorrater (1095745)]

Parent is exactly right. They either have the choice to not work in china or to obey the government. So, we can either do the superficially morally-correct thing, or we can get a foot in the door of the next great superpower that has a longstanding record of human rights abuse, and make sure that foot is the greatest tool for the spreading of information since the printing press.

Please, someone explain why he's marked as a troll when, in reality, he's exactly right.

Re:Troll my ass

[MightyMartian (840721)]

Because he's not. If IBM can be raked over the coals for doing business with Nazis, then Yahoo, Google and Microsoft deserve no less. If De Beers can be raked over the coals for its role in the horrors of the African diamond trade, then Yahoo, Google and Microsoft deserve no less.

How precisely is Yahoo helping making China free by selling out dissidents? Explain precisely how Google is bringing freedom to the masses in China by censoring the Tiananmen Square incidents?

They are colluders, profiteers and immoral traitors to the societies in which they were created. Corporations exist as legal fictions in the industrialized world as a favor to their investors, but I see no reason that if those investors and those they put in positions of authority within the corporate entity decide to piss on the human rights that the industrialized world have taken since the Enlightenment to be inalieable that notions of legal fictions of personhood should stand. I think a consistent threat to strip corporations doing business in other parts of the world of their personhood, making directors and stockholders directly criminally and civily responsible for the actions of their foreign dummy companies would go a looong way. Let the cowards and villains in China's government persecute their own citizens, without the collusion of Western companies.

Make that the price of China doing business with the West.

Re:

[gorbachev (512743)]

If you don't see the difference between actively working WITH an oppressive Government and knowingly buying merchandise from rapists, kidnappers and torturers and responding to a LEGALLY issued subpoena, I don't really expect you to see things realistically.

Yahoo obeys the laws of China no matter how immoral you think those laws are.

They didn't sell out anyone.

Re:I don't understand what Yahoo is supposed to do

[TheGratefulNet (143330)]

What's Yahoo supposed to do when faced with a subpoena from the Chinese Government?

dunno - wait it out and see if they come back an hour later?

Why trash the pygmies?

[EmbeddedJanitor (597831)]

They're a fine race of people that do not deserve to be grouped with Yahoo execs or even congressmen. Just because they lack lobby groups means its OK to mock their stature etc does it?

Let's see a Congressman get away with substituting in Black/Jew whatever and lasting out the day.

Re:

[reverseengineer (580922)]

I think the congressman was trying to make analogy to a quote by Gen. Omar Bradley, "Ours is a world of nuclear giants and ethical infants." Really, the metaphor actually works better with Lantos's formulation, but Bradley's formulation wisely recognizes that using one of the terms which describes a short stature adult would place that term, and thus the group associated with it, in a pejorative light.