Zuckerberg: U.S. should have been more open on NSA program

MENLO PARK, Calif., Feb. 4 (UPI) -- Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg said Tuesday the U.S. government should have been more open about its domestic surveillance program.

"I wish that the government had been more transparent about this up front," Zuckerberg said, referring to the National Security Agency's massive collection of telephone data.

"I think that the government made a lot of mistakes in terms of not being clear about what they were using information for," Zuckerberg told NBC's "Today" show. "If you ask Americans, they want the government to protect us, so it's not that they don't want any of this stuff. But I think they also want the government to be honest and clear about what's going on. And I think that's the line that was missed here."

Last year, the Facebook chief executive officer said his Internet business and similar companies sustained a loss after former NSA contractor Edward Snowden's leaks revealed the scope of the NSA's program.

"The trust metrics for all [tech companies] went down when Prism came out," Zuckerberg said at the time.