Microsoft received 37,000 end-user data requests in first half of year

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Tech group asks 21 countries to disclose surveillance requests

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Yahoo says it gave the feds info for most data requests received in first half of 2013

Yahoo received 12,444 requests from the U.S. government for user data in the first half of this year, resulting in 11,402 instances of data disclosure, it said Friday in its first transparency report.

For nearly 7,000 of the U.S. requests between Jan. 1 and June 30, only non-content data was disclosed, such as basic subscriber information including email and IP addresses, billing information, names and locations, Yahoo said.

But more than 4,500 U.S. government data requests resulted in the disclosure of actual content like communications from users’ Mail and Messenger accounts, Yahoo Address Book entries, files uploaded, and photos on Flickr, according to the report.

The total number of accounts specified in Yahoo’s government data requests comprised less than one-hundredth of 1 percent of Yahoo’s worldwide user base, according to the company.

Governments of 17 countries made nearly 30,000 data requests involving almost 63,000 Yahoo accounts, the report said.

The report was released amid a series of leaks by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden regarding the government’s ability to gather data from people’s digital communications, ostensibly in the interest of national security. One of the most high-profile leaks concerns a program known as Prism, which reportedly enables the NSA to collect data from Google, Apple, Microsoft, Yahoo, and other tech companies.

Since the first leaks in June by Snowden to media outlets including the Guardian and The New York Times, tech companies such as Google and Microsoft have asked for permission to provide greater clarity about the number of national security requests they receive specifically.

Currently, companies can reveal the number of requests made under the U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act only if they lump them together with all other requests from U.S. law enforcement agencies.

Yahoo, therefore, did not break out its national security requests. “We include national security requests within the scope of our aggregate statistics,” Yahoo general counsel Ron Bell said in a blog post.

Also, the report only reflects Yahoo’s data—not data from Tumblr users, the company said. Yahoo announced its acquisition of the social blogging site in May. Tumblr will issue its own transparency report at a later date, Yahoo said.

Yahoo claims to have 700 million active users total across 60 countries. The company does not reveal its number of active U.S. users.

Yahoo said it regularly pushes back against improper requests for user data, including fighting requests that are unclear or unlawful, Bell said.

Yahoo plans to update its transparency report every six months.

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Facebook got 25,000 government requests about users in the first half of 2013

Facebook received more than 25,000 requests from governments about its users during the first half of 2013, with nearly half of those requests coming from U.S. law enforcement and related agencies, the company said.

U.S. agencies made 11,000 to 12,000 requests for Facebook user information during the first six months of the year, with the rest of the world’s governments making about 14,600 requests, Facebook said in its first global government requests report, released Tuesday.

Other countries with high numbers of requests: India with 3,245, the U.K. with 1,975, Germany with 1,886, and Italy with 1,705.

The “vast majority” of the requests related to criminal cases, Colin Stretch, Facebook’s general counsel, wrote in the report. In many cases, the requests seek basic subscriber information, such as name and length of membership, while in other cases, law enforcement officials seek IP addresses or account content, he wrote.

Facebook doesn’t honor every request. In the U.S., Facebook provided some information in response to 79 percent of the requests, while in the U.K., it provided some information in 68 percent. The percentage was much lower for several countries. For example, Facebook provided information in response to just 27 percent of Argentina’s 152 requests and 39 percent of France’s 1,547 requests.

“We have stringent processes in place to handle all government data requests,” Stretch wrote. “We believe this process protects the data of the people who use our service, and requires governments to meet a very high legal bar with each individual request in order to receive any information about any of our users. We fight many of these requests, pushing back when we find legal deficiencies and narrowing the scope of overly broad or vague requests.”

Google and some other tech companies have released similar reports about government requests. Google began releasing a government data transparency report in 2009; in the second half of 2012, Google received more than 21,000 requests about its users.

Privacy International, a U.K.-based privacy group, applauded Facebook for releasing the numbers, but said recent leaks about data collection at the U.S. National Security Agency show that these kinds of transparency reports have limited use.

“We are left with a disturbingly hollow feeling regarding Facebook’s gesture, and it has little to do with Facebook itself,” the group said in a blog post. “Since [the NSA documents] have been published and analysed, the veil has been lifted on what information governments actually collect about us.”

The Facebook report only details lawful data requests, the group said. “We are now aware of a terrifying reality—that governments don’t necessarily need intermediaries like Facebook, Google, and Microsoft to get our data,” it added. “They can intercept it over undersea cables, through secret court orders, and through intelligence sharing.”

Grant Gross covers technology and telecom policy in the U.S. government for The IDG News Service.
More by Grant Gross, IDG News Service

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