Zuckerberg: The Government 'Blew It' When It Comes To NSA Spying

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in an interview at TechCrunch's Disrupt conference yesterday that the U.S. government "blew it" when it comes to spying by the NSA.

Zuckerberg said the government doesn't do a good enough job at balancing citizens' personal privacy and liberties against potential security threats.

His statements carry a lot of weight. Facebook was one of the tech companies named in the documents about the NSA spying program PRISM that was leaked a few months ago. Facebook later denied that it gives the government "direct access" to user data.

More recently, Facebook, Yahoo, and others have asked the government to allow it to be more open about the kind of requests for user data it gets from the government. It's a relatively common practice for tech companies to get requests from the government for user data, but they legally can't discuss much about it.

According to Politico, Zuckerberg will meet with four top Republicans in the House of Representatives next week to discuss NSA spying.

Yahoo CEO Marissa Mayer, who also spoke at TechCrunch Disrupt yesterday, said it would be "treason" if Yahoo shared more details about what kind of data requests it gets from the government.