Failing to address the overreach of U.S. government surveillance...

School, where Wyden went to high school in Palo Alto, California. “The cost,” said Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt, “is huge in terms of knowledge, discovery, science, growth, jobs.” Countries around the world will start implementing data localization requirements, said Microsoft General Counsel Brad Smith. In the last few months alone, 20 governments have either proposed or discussed such laws, said Dropbox General Counsel Ramsey Homsany. Cloud storage services like Dropbox rely on the ability to store data anywhere, the industry officials said. Requirements to keep individuals’ data stored locally would kill cloud-based storage, they said. In turn, the Internet slows down, becomes less personalized and costs are driven up as companies are required to put data centers in each country, said Facebook General Counsel Colin Stretch. Data localization also is a threat to civil liberties, he said. Insisting on local data storage could “result in quite possibly more access by state sponsored surveillance,” he said. Governments have been able to sell data localization as a consumer protection measure, Schmidt said, when in fact localization erodes “the architecture that all these companies and all the startups really need to have.” Wyden touted his industry-supported Digital Trade Act (S-1788), which would prevent cross-border data flow restrictions and prohibit localization requirements, as a first step toward ensuring the continued health of the digital economy. But it’s no fix for the “reckless broad surveillance,” which “hampers our ability” to convince countries to accept the free flow of data, Wyden said.