Yesterday the Obama administration met with numerous companies involved in the government's domestic spy program (including the CEOs of Apple and AT&T), as well as privacy and consumer advocacy groups to discuss the government's ever-blossoming surveillance scandal. Today the administration unveiled the results of those talks, and stated they'll take four steps in an effort to appease critics:

• Obama claimed he'll work with Congress to reform Section 215 of the Patriot Act. That's the portion of the Act that's supposed to restrict wholesale data collection to just those involved in serious terrorism activities, but has been interpreted by the Bush and Obama administrations to mean they can collect and store data on, well, everyone.

• Obama claimed he'll work with Congress to improve the oversight within the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. Last week, the administration had already stated that they would be open to adding an attorney to advocate on behalf of privacy rights.

• Wants to improve the transparency of government programs, including the creation of a website "hub for information on intelligence activities." So far, that website has been called The Guardian, and the government's interest in genuine transparency has been nonexistent.

•Wants to appoint a high-level task force of outside intelligence and civil liberties specialists with the aim of advising the government on how to balance security and privacy.

Obama insisted that the government wants to ensure our "efforts are in line with our interests and our values" while promising the government is "not interested in spying on ordinary people." All of that said, hard details for the reform plan were all but nonexistent, and the government's credibility on most of these issues remains largely nonexistent.

Obama also reiterated that he didn't believe Snowden was a "patriot," while at the same time acknowledging Snowden's leaks resulted in a "more rapid and passionate" response than would have happened otherwise. Granted, Obama's very presence and the reforms are thanks to what Snowden did, though the President repeatedly pretended the reforms would have come voluntarily.

The Obama administration's press conference came a day after the NSA revealed it would be getting rid of 90% of their system administrators in the hopes of increasing spy program secrecy. It also came the same day that new revelations were made by Edward Snowden and the Guardian that the NSA has been using 2011 changes made to Section 702 under the FISA Amendments Act to spy on the phone and Internet data of Americans without warrants.

That's of course in direct opposition to government statements, including Obama's claim this week to Jay Leno that the United States doesn't actually have a domestic spy program. Given the history of the government's lies on this front, many people will believe serious and meaningful reform only when they see it.