Amazon and others are done keeping data center deals secret. Is it enough to build trust?
TechCrunch Theresa Loconsolo ● Covered by 2 sources
Amazon will stop using NDAs in talks with local governments over data centers. That could ease backlash — but trust is still the hard part.
Based on reporting by TechCrunch, Theresa Loconsolo — read the original for the full story.
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Amazon says it will stop using nondisclosure agreements when it negotiates data center deals with local governments, a shift that follows Microsoft’s similar move earlier this year. The companies are finally acting like the secrecy itself is part of the problem. Around AI infrastructure, that secrecy has fed community anger instead of calming it.
The backlash hasn’t stayed theoretical. It has helped drive hundreds of proposed and enacted moratoriums, stretching from New York to San Francisco. Once local officials and residents start feeling shut out of the process, the politics harden fast. And then every new server farm looks less like an investment and more like something being done to the neighborhood.
That’s the backdrop for the latest episode of TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, where Anthony Ha, Sean O’Kane, and Rebecca Bellan talk through whether dropping NDAs will actually change how data center deals are negotiated. The answer is probably not as much as the companies hope. Silence can be removed, but suspicion doesn’t vanish with one policy tweak.
The episode also turns to a different kind of trust problem: personal AI startups. A wave of them wants users to hand over access to inboxes, files, and credit cards, then persuades websites to let their agents in. That only works if people believe the system will behave, and if the rest of the internet agrees to play along. Trust, in other words, is the product — whether these startups want to admit it or not. The episode also includes a couple of deals of the week.
My take — AI-written commentary, not fact-checked reporting
Good move, but only the first sensible one. Dropping NDAs is what you do when you’ve noticed that acting mysterious makes people assume the worst — a lesson the AI industry keeps relearning in public. The same trust problem is sitting right in front of the personal AI crowd too: if a product needs access to your inbox, your files, and your card, it had better earn more than a glossy demo.
Read more about this at: TechCrunch
