Investors Withdraw Verizon Shareholder Proposal on Government Surveillance Programs
JANUARY 28, 2014 // BOSTON, MA: A coalition of investors, which had requested that Verizon Communications Inc. (NYSE: VZ) publish regular reports on government and law enforcement requests for confidential customer data, today commended the company for publishing its first report and made recommendations for improving future reports. The coalition was led by Trillium Asset Management (Trillium), which filed a shareholder resolution on behalf of Park Foundation, in close partnership with Open MIC, a non-profit organization that works to foster more open and democratic media. The investors’ announcement follows yesterday’s news that the Obama Administration will permit more detailed disclosures …
Trillium Wins Significant Victory in Net Neutrality Fight
Trillium Asset Management and other socially responsible investors have won a significant victory in the fight for net neutrality. After years of denial, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) ruled that investors will have the opportunity to press Internet Service Providers (ISPs) AT&T, Verizon and Sprint to adopt policies that would insure their neutral handling of all Internet content regardless of the sender, recipient or nature of the content. The companies had sought to block shareholders from voting on the proposals by arguing, among other things, that network neutrality was not a “significant public policy issue.” The SEC rejected that …
Investors to AT&T: Let Shareholders Vote on Open, Free Internet Access for All
October 26, 2011 NEW YORK – Shareholders of AT&T Inc. have filed a proposal calling for the company “to publicly commit to operate its wireless broadband network consistent with network neutrality principles” that would maintain open access to the Internet on wireless networks. The filing comes only weeks before implementation of new Federal Communications Commission rules on network neutrality that provide a broad exemption for wireless broadband networks – the fastest growing segment of the Internet. AT&T has sought in the past to block shareholders from voting on network neutrality issues. A similar shareholder proposal on wireless networks was excluded …
Trillium Urges FCC to Adopt Strong Open Internet Principles
Last week Trillium Asset Management Corporation and OpenMIC filed comments with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) in support of its efforts to protect the free and open nature of the Internet. The FCC initiative by the Obama Administration, also referred to by many as Net Neutrality, is vitally important to our rights to freedom of speech and our ability to speak out for social justice. It helps preserve the Internet as a level playing field where individuals and groups can speak up on behalf of social justice without censorship or interference from the mainstream media filters. It is also a …
Open MIC Announces Significant Shareholder Votes on Internet Privacy and Freedom of Speech
Investors in two major U.S. Internet Service Providers – CenturyTel, Inc. and EarthLink, Inc. – voted in substantial numbers in favor of a first-time shareholder resolution that highlighted the importance of Internet management practices and their impact on Internet privacy and freedom of expression. The resolutions, which were filed and voted on for the first time this year, attracted 30.49% of the vote at CenturyTel and 9.25% at EarthLink. Taken together, the votes mean that investors controlling stock worth more than $900 million voted in favor of the resolutions at the two companies. “This is the kind of vote that …
RiskMetrics calls Open MIC Internet Project "biggest new campaign in the human rights arena for the 2009 U.S. proxy season."
Risk Metrics Group (RMG), the nation’s largest and most influential proxy advisory firm, provides research to some of the world’s largest and most important financial institutions about the environmental and social issues shareholders raise in proxy statements. It’s guidance to large pension funds often determines the fate of shareholder proposals filed by Trillium Asset Management and our fellow shareholder activists. We were, therefore, very pleased when RMG recently wrote a lengthy piece on the Open MIC shareholder initiative describing it as the “biggest new campaign in the human rights arena for the 2009 U.S. proxy season.” The story discusses the …
Open MIC, founded by Trillium, files shareholder resolutions with 10 Internet Service Providers
Professor Jeffery Rosen recently wrote in the New York Times, “As more and more speech migrates online, to blogs and social-networking sites and the like, the ultimate power to decide who has an opportunity to be heard, and what we may say, lies increasingly with Internet service providers, search engines and other Internet companies…” Members of a coalition of investors, lead by Trillium, have filed shareholder resolutions with 10 publicly-held U.S. providers of Internet access, urging corporate boards to report on the impact of the companies’ Internet network management practices on public expectations of freedom of expression and privacy. The …
Seattle Times Publishes Op-Ed by Open MIC and Trillium
The Seattle Times published an Op-Ed by Open MIC and Trillium Asset Management Corporation: “FCC shouldn’t tolerate abuses by Internet’s corporate gatekeepers.” The Op-Ed challenges Comcast, AT&T and a host of other Internet Service Providers for their secretive, invasive and deceptive practices that compromise consumers’ privacy and freedom of expression. To read the article, click here http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/opinion/2008114549_openoped15.html …
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