FTC Chair Warns Companies Against Weakening Data Protections (1)

American companies including Meta Platforms Inc. and Apple Inc. need to resist pressure from foreign governments to weaken security protections for American consumers, Federal Trade Commission Chairman Andrew Ferguson wrote in a letter sent to more than a dozen companies Thursday.

The letter follows concerns that the United Kingdom was pressuring Apple to provide a backdoor to encrypted U.S. user data under its Online Safety Act.

“I am concerned that these actions by foreign powers to impose censorship and weaken end-to-end encryption will erode Americans’ freedoms and subject them to myriad harms, such as surveillance by foreign governments and an ...