New NVIDIA NDA is causing controversy for restricting journalism

NVIDIA finds itself in the cross hairs once more as the firm send a new non disclosure agreement (NDA) to members of the press. The document is severely more restricting than NVIDIA's previous NDA document, and the firm only gave two days to journalists to agree to the new terms.

German tech site Heise blasts NVIDIA for violating journalistic principles. In particular, the document, which does not refer to any particular product, demands that any confidential information provided to the party must be used "solely for the benefit of NVIDIA". Additionally, the NDA imposes a 5-year expiry on confidential information, and prohibits journalists from posting predictions or rumors based on confidential information.

NVIDIA’s new NDA basically says that any confidential information provided to the party must be used ‘solely for the benefit of NVIDIA‘. This could be understood in many ways, but for a journalist sharing confidential information does not always mean reporting in favor of the new product, sometimes it is the opposite. So does criticism break new NDA? Heise.de is worried this could prevent journalists from writing whatever they want.

Furthermore, new NDA also imposes 5-year expiration on confidential information. Journalists from Heise are concerned this could keep their mouth shut for 5 years should they decide to sign it.

More details and a copy of the NDA can be found at VideoCardz. Tech publications need to sign these documents to gain early access to samples and/or briefings about upcoming products or technologies.