owlsbooks Chapter 396 The FBI Comes Knocking
Chapter 396 The FBI Comes Knocking
January 16, 2001, 9:00 AM.
Ling Yun got out of the car. In front of him was the Xingyu Technology office building, a twelve-story building. The bronze Xingyu logo, a five-pointed star, was embedded in the ground at the entrance, gleaming from being stepped on by the people coming and going. The glass doors were spotless, reflecting the sea and sky across the way.
Carly and Fiona stood in the doorway. Carly wore a dark gray suit skirt, her hair styled in an updo, revealing a pair of silver earrings. Fiona wore a white shirt and dark blue trousers, holding a black notebook. They saw Ling Yun get out of the car and took a few steps forward.
"Mr. Ling." Carly extended her hand, and Ling Yun shook it. Fiona nodded beside her and said, "Mr. Ling."
Ling Yun nodded and followed them inside. The lobby had light gray marble floors that gleamed. The Xingyu logo, blue and glowing, hung on the wall behind the reception desk. The receptionist stood up and said, "Good morning, Mr. Ling," to which Ling Yun nodded.
The elevator reached the tenth floor, the doors opened, and Ling Yun and his group stepped out. The corridor was carpeted in dark gray, and Xingyu's product posters hung on the walls—some for desktop, some for mobile, and several showing user growth curves. Carly quickly walked over and pushed open the conference room door.
David was already seated inside, a laptop spread out in front of him, preparing for the meeting. Seeing Ling Yun enter, he stood up, walked over, and shook hands.
"President Ling."
Ling Yun sat down in the main seat. Carly sat to his left, David to his right, and Fiona sat near the door with a laptop open in front of her. The conference room was quiet for a few seconds, with only the sound of the air conditioner.
Carly spoke first. She opened the folder in front of her and began to read. "StarTalk's data for last month. Global registered users: 120 million. Monthly active users: 68 million. Daily active users: 23 million. Average user time spent: 52 minutes per day. Messages sent: 1.2 billion per day. File transfers: 8 million per day. Voice calls: 3 million minutes per day. Video calls: 500,000 minutes per day." She paused, looking at Ling Yun, "User growth and activity levels are in line with expectations. Revenue last month was $12 million. This mainly came from enterprise subscriptions and value-added services; GG revenue accounted for a very small percentage, less than 10%."
Lingyun asked her, "How many customers does the enterprise version have?"
Carly said, "There are 3,200 clients. Large clients include JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, General Electric, Boeing, and Pfizer. There are even more small and medium-sized enterprises, distributed across various industries. On average, each enterprise paying user contributes four dollars per month. Paying users for value-added services contribute an average of two dollars per month. The overall ARPU is $1.20. Not high, but stable."
Ling Yun nodded. He looked at David and asked, "What about the products?"
David turned the laptop around so Lingyun could see the screen. It displayed a product roadmap, with time on the horizontal axis and functional modules on the vertical axis. Pointing to several nodes, he said, "For the desktop version, version 6.0 was released last month. The main improvements are in audio and video call quality and file transfer speed. User feedback has been very positive, with high ratings. For the web version, version 5.0 is under development and will be released as a beta version next month. The main improvements are in power and data saving. Power consumption is reduced by 30% compared to the previous version, and data consumption is reduced by 20%. There's also a group chat function; it now supports large groups of 500 people, and the management tools have been upgraded. For the enterprise version, a new feature called 'Star Language Meeting Room' will be released this month. It supports 100 terminals simultaneously online for meetings, screen sharing, meeting recording, and automatic generation of meeting minutes."
Lingyun asked him, "When will the meeting room feature be available?"
David said, "It's almost the end of the month. The beta version has been running for three weeks, and the feedback has been okay. Stability still needs further optimization, but the functionality is complete."
Ling Yun nodded. "Yes, not bad. Everyone's performance has been good. I'm very satisfied with the current situation. We've entered a period of stable development. Carly will organize everyone to take paid leave in batches this year. We can find a few vacation spots for everyone to relax. The company will reimburse the expenses."
Upon hearing the boss's words, everyone immediately beamed with joy.
"If there's nothing else, everyone can go and think about where would be suitable." Ling Yun waved to everyone, indicating that the meeting was over.
Carly closed the folder, looked at Ling Yun, and said, "Mr. Ling, there's one more thing I need to tell you privately."
Ling Yun looked at her and nodded. The two stood up, walked out the door, and closed it. Fiona looked up at her, then looked down again. David typed on his laptop without looking up.
The two arrived at the office together. Carly looked at Ling Yun and lowered her voice slightly. "The FBI came to us last week. They had a court order demanding our cooperation. They want to monitor users' information, claiming it's for illegal and criminal activities."
Ling Yun didn't speak.
Carly continued, "The warrant was issued by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. It requires us to provide communications, contact lists, login records, and location information for specific users. The user list includes seven people, all U.S. citizens with Arabic names and Middle Eastern backgrounds. The FBI says this is a counterterrorism investigation, and under the Patriot Act, we are obligated to cooperate. Failure to cooperate constitutes obstruction of justice, which would not only punish the company but also imprison the responsible parties."
Lingyun asked her, "What did you say to them?"
Carly said, "I said I needed to discuss it with my legal team, and they said they could give me three days. After three days, I had to give them a response. My legal team reviewed the writ and said it was legal and compliant. The court signed it, and we couldn't refuse."
Ling Yun didn't speak. He stood up, pacing back and forth in thought for a while.
Ling Yun turned to Carly and said, "We can give them the data from the US servers. If the law requires it, we'll give it to them."
"However, we cannot provide data from other regions. Data from Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and Africa—none of them. It's not a legal issue; it's a matter of trust. Users store their data with us because they trust us. If we hand over our data to the US government, users will lose trust in us. That's our bottom line."
Carly looked at him and asked, "What if the FBI requests data on European users?"
Ling Yun said, "Let them go through legal procedures. Our data stored in European data centers is under the jurisdiction of European countries. If the US government wants European data, it needs European law, European courts, and European writs. US writs are valid in the US, but not in Europe. In Europe, what matters is European law. European law requires the protection of user privacy and does not allow data to be handed over to third parties, including governments, casually. We abide by European law. If European law says we can give it, we will. If European law says we cannot, we will not. That's the rule."
Carly didn't speak. She lowered her head and wrote a line in her notebook. Then she looked up at Ling Yun and said, "Mr. Ling, I understand."