Amazon Transparency Report Shows Few Requests For User Data

Amazon has released its first transparency report, and for a company as large as Amazon, there is surprisingly little in the way of detail or explanation in the report. The company reported that it received 813 subpoenas, 25 search warrants, and 0-249 national security requests. Of the 813...

Snapchat Publishes First Transparency Report

Snapchat has released its first transparency report, covering a four-month period from November through February, and the data shows that the company didn’t receive any National Security Letters and got fewer than 400 total requests for data from the United States government. Snapchat, a Californ...

Dennis Fisher and Mike Mimoso on the Android App-Replacement Vulnerability, Windows Privilege Escalation and More

Dennis Fisher and Mike Mimoso discuss the news of the week, including the Android app-replacement vulnerability, the Windows privilege escalation bug and the Yahoo transparency report and the company’s crypto efforts. Download: digitalunderground192.mp3 Music by Chris Gonsalves...

U.S. Government Requests for Yahoo User Data Drop

Yahoo received nearly 5,000 requests for user data from the United States government in the last six months of 2014 and disclosed some content in nearly 25 percent of those cases. The company said in its new transparency report that it received between 0-999 National Security Letters from the U.S...

Facebook Transparency Report: Government Requests Down

Facebook today reported a slight drop in government requests for user data, bucking a trend that peaked during the first half of 2014 with the highest numbers the company had seen. Its latest transparency report covers the second half of last year, and shows slight dips in requests for user data,...

Cheezburgers, Warrant Canaries and Cat Memes

Surveillance, privacy and security are serious subjects. So too, for some people, are cat memes and GIFs of screaming goats. And Cheezburger Inc., the premier purveyor of said memes and GIFs, wants its users to know that the company is standing up for their rights. The folks at Cheezburger have...

Reddit Publishes its First Transparency Report

Reddit on Thursday published its first transparency report, joining the litany of technology and online service providers who have already shed light on their privacy practices, and the extent to which governments makes requests for user information. Reddit thrives on user-submitted content...

Government Demands for Verizon Customer Data Drop

The number of subpoenas, total orders and warrants that the United States government delivered to Verizon all dropped in the second half of 2014, according to the company’s latest transparency report. The giant telecom provider released data on Thursday that showed a decrease in subpoenas of abou...

Government Requests for Facebook User Data Increasing

Facebook’s latest transparency report shows that U.S law enforcement agencies issued a greater number of total requests for user data related to criminal investigations in the first six months of 2014 than they have over any previous such period. This report, per Justice Department reporting...

AOL Releases Transparency Report Lobbies for USA FREEDOM Act

Noting that Saturday was the 13th anniversary of the passage of the USA PATRIOT Act, the Web giant AOL this week released its latest transparency report, detailing estimations of how many Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act FISA orders and National Security Letters NSLs it’s received in the las...

Twitter Files Suit Over Government Restrictions on National Security Letter Data

Twitter has filed a lawsuit in federal court asking that the United States Department of Justice’s prohibitions on publishing the number and kind of government requests for data the company receives be declared unconstitutional. The suit claims that the rules infringe on Twitter’s right to free...

September 2014 Yahoo Transparency Report

There was less clamor from governments and law enforcement around the world for data collected and stored by Yahoo, but nonetheless, the technology giant still fielded more than 18,000 data requests over the first six months of the year. Yahoo yesterday released its third Transparency Report, and...

2014 Google Transparency Report Requests for Data Up Again

Against a backdrop of new surveillance programs being uncovered in New Zealand and allegations of the NSA and GCHQ’s penetration of Deutsche Telekom in Germany, Google yesterday published its biannual Transparency Report for the first half of 2014. Google’s numbers reflect not only a continually...

Dropbox Reports 80 Percent of Subpoenas Contain Gag Request

Most U.S. government subpoenas for data on Dropbox users are accompanied with a request not to inform the user in question. Dropbox legal counsel Bart Volkmer said those gag orders are repelled unless there is a valid court order. The revelation accompanied the release of the cloud storage...

Twitter 'Weighing Legal Options' On Publishing National Security Requests Data

Twitter officials are pushing the United States government for more freedom to publish specific numbers about national security information requests, and said the company is considering its legal options if the government doesn’t allow more data to be made public. In its latest transparency repor...

New Verizon Transparency Report Shows Large Government Appetite for Location, Content Data

Verizon said in a new transparency report that though the number of some kinds of orders dropped–including wiretap orders and warrants–others rose, including general orders and pen register and trap and trace orders, and the company received nearly 150,000 total orders in the first half of 2014...

New Data Shows FBI Issued More Than 19k National Security Letters in 2013

The United States federal government issued more than 19,000 National Security Letters–perhaps its most powerful tool for domestic intelligence collection–in 2013, and those NSLs contained more than 38,000 individual requests for information. The new data was released by the Office of the Directo...

Of TrueCrypt and the Warrant Canary

Apple’s first transparency report, released last November, was one in a string of many released following the start of the Snowden leaks by technology companies trying to distance themselves from the tentacles of NSA surveillance. Apple’s report, however, contained two sentences that made it stan...

Government Requests for Google User Data Continue to Climb

While the number of requests for user information that Google receives from governments around the world continues to rise–climbing by 120 percent in the last four years–the company is turning over some data in fewer cases as time goes on. Google received more than 27,000 requests for user...

Time Warner Cable Publishes First Transparency Report

Time Warner Cable has joined a half-dozen telecommunications and technology companies that, in the past six months, have published their first transparency report on government and law enforcement requests for user data and content. Since the Edward Snowden leaks began last June, transparency...