Facebook and Microsoft announced Friday that the U.S. government is allowing them to disclose U.S. national security-related requests they received, but lumped together with other law enforcement requests. Google pushed back against those conditions.
“Since this story was first reported, we’ve been in discussions with U.S. national security authorities urging them to allow more transparency and flexibility around national security-related orders we are required to comply with,” Ted Ullyot, Facebook’s general counsel, wrote in a blog post.
“We’re pleased that as a result of our discussions, we can now include in a transparency report all U.S. national security-related requests (including FISA as well as National Security Letters) — which until now no company has been permitted to do.”
The social-networking company reported that for the six months ending December 31, it had received between 9,000 and 10,000 user data requests from U.S. local, state and federal governments, including national security-related requests, Ullyot said. Between 18,000 and 19,000 Facebook user accounts were affected by the requests, he said.
Microsoft, for its part, said it received between 6,000 and 7,000 such requests over the same period, affecting between 31,000 and 32,000 consumer accounts, according to a statement from John Frank, the company’s deputy general counsel.
The announcements come after Google, Facebook, Microsoft and Yahoo called on the government to allow them to disclose national security requests for user information. The firms have been scrambling to respond after media reports named them and a slew of other tech companies as participating in a National Security Agency Internet surveillance program called PRISM.
Google indicated it was less than satisfied with what the government is authorizing.
“We have always believed that it’s important to differentiate between different types of government requests,” a Google spokesman said. “We already publish criminal requests separately from National Security Letters. Lumping the two categories together would be a step back for users.”
“Our request to the government is clear: to be able to publish aggregate numbers of national security requests, including FISA disclosures, separately,” the spokesman added.
Citing Facebook’s 1.1 billion monthly active users worldwide, Ullyot said the disclosure shows only a “tiny fraction of one percent of our user accounts” were subjects of U.S. state, local and federal government data requests.
“We hope this helps put into perspective the numbers involved, and lays to rest some of the hyperbolic and false assertions in some recent press accounts about the frequency and scope of the data requests that we receive,” he said.
“This only impacts a tiny fraction of Microsoft’s global customer base,” said Frank of Microsoft. He said the software giant believes “what we are permitted to publish continues to fall short of what is needed to help the community understand and debate these issues.”
Earlier this week, Google wrote to Attorney General Eric Holder and FBI Director Robert Mueller asking to be able to publish aggregate national security-related requests, including FISA disclosures, “in terms of both the number we receive and their scope.”
Both Google and Facebook were reported Friday to be in talks with the government to disclose more about national security data requests.
