WASHINGTON — Technology company executives pressed President Barack Obama on Tuesday to rein in the US government's electronic spying after a court dealt a blow to the administration's surveillance practices. Top executives from Apple Inc, Google Inc, Yahoo Inc, Netflix Inc, Comcast Corp , AT&T Inc, Microsoft Corp, Twitter Inc , Facebook Inc and other companies met privately for more than two hours with Obama and top White House aides. The session came as Obama and his national security team decide what recommendations to adopt from an outside panel's review on constraining the activities of the National Security Agency (NSA)without compromising US national security. The White House had trumpeted the meeting as a chance to talk up progress made in repairing the government's healthcare website after its botched roll-out generated a political firestorm and sent Obama's job approval rating tumbling. But in a brief statement released after the session, the tech companies focused solely on government surveillance, not healthcare. “We appreciated the opportunity to share directly with the president our principles on government surveillance that we released last week and we urge him to move aggressively on reform,” the technology companies said in their statement. The NSA's practices essentially made the companies partners in sweeping government surveillance efforts against private citizens. A senior administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity, described the meeting as constructive and “not at all contentious.” Obama and a clutch of his top advisers listened closely to the company executives' ideas and concerns, the official added. — Reuters
