I don't know about these new accusations about a Google employee doing covert work for the State Dept., but as far as them getting reimbursed for compliance costs, I don't really see that as scandalous.
The Guardian strongly implies that this contradicts their earlier denials about knowing anything about PRISM. But PRISM could just be the NSA's internal name for the program that collects data obtained from companies via court order. From the companies' perspective, they're just complying with court orders. Theres nothing in the Guardian's reporting that contradicts that, at least as far as I can see.
Assange's implication that getting reimbursed for court costs is some sort of business model for Google ("taking NSA money in exchange for handing over people's data") is absurd. They take advertisers' money for handing over people's data, not the government's.
The guardian is really letting me down with the sheer amount of sensationalist reporting going on. They hit the jackpot with Snowden, but they keep trying to milk it and stretch the story out. Quoting the Gmail class action court filings incorrectly and putting words in Google's mouth was a low point.
Guardian had to publish a correction. They also mindlessly copied the press release from Consumer Watchdog and tried to connect the subject to PRISM, which it has nothing to do with (this is about automated Gmail ads).
"Consumer Watchdog, the advocacy group that uncovered the filing, called the revelation a "stunning admission." It comes as Google and its peers are under pressure to explain their role in the National Security Agency's (NSA) mass surveillance of US citizens and foreign nationals."
Your Daily Finance link contains nothing that supports your claim.
Your second link in that paragraph is to a conspiracy site that basically declares anyone who ever is on the same side as Microsoft on any issue to be a Microsoft astroturfer or to have been infiltrated by Microsoft. Among things they claim are under the control of Microsoft: NPR, the Department of Education, the White House, the French government, all major newspapers, Amazon, Yahoo. The page you linked to is up to their usual standards--they base their argument on a Google search showing the CW has criticized Google more than it has criticized Microsoft, and on CW hosting its site on a hosting service that is part of a company that provides services for managing and contacting people.
It's probably best to start with more mainstream sites when researching something, such as the Wikipedia entry for the thing you are researching [1], rather than heading right to the conspiracy sites like Boycott Novell.
I always head to Wikipedia first, but Wikipedia does not always have the complete story. Wikipedia has nothing on FairSearch, and the evidence is pretty solid that Microsoft is behind this group. Nor did it say anything about Florian Mueller being on the dole from Oracle or Microsoft until recently (check the Wikipedia history of his page) when he admitted even, even when we knew for years that this was in fact the case given the sheer volume of articles he writes attacking only Microsoft and Oracle's competitors.
Consumer Watchdog isn't just critical of Google, they are rabidly so to a deranged order. They've got an entire site, http://insidegoogle.com/ dedicated to nothing but 100% Google attacks.
This is the smoking gun modus operandi of astroturf. Does other consumer groups, like Consumers Union/Reports, or Center for Science In the Public Interest maintain sites exclusively dedicated to attacking a single company? They claim their issue is privacy, but if you look on their sight, they attack Google pretty much on everything, for example, they side against consumers and with publishers on Google Books.
Whatever other projects they've got going, it smells fishy. It smells like astroturf.
The Guardian strongly implies that this contradicts their earlier denials about knowing anything about PRISM. But PRISM could just be the NSA's internal name for the program that collects data obtained from companies via court order. From the companies' perspective, they're just complying with court orders. Theres nothing in the Guardian's reporting that contradicts that, at least as far as I can see.
Assange's implication that getting reimbursed for court costs is some sort of business model for Google ("taking NSA money in exchange for handing over people's data") is absurd. They take advertisers' money for handing over people's data, not the government's.
Guardian's report: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/aug/23/nsa-prism-costs...