Microsoft just released data on its government requests (including FISA) too. For the last six months last year, Microsoft received between 6,000 and 7,000 government requests affecting between 31,000 and 32,000 accounts. [Microsoft]
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Facebook is finally going to come clean. Or well, as clean as the government will allow it to. Like Google’s Transparency Report and like similar reports given by Microsoft and Twitter, Facebook is releasing its data on the amount of government requests it receives. Of course, the numbers are completely unspecific but that’s not exactly Facebook’s fault, it comes with the territory.
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Facebook lawyer Ted Ullyot revealed in a post tonight precisely how many user-data requests it receives from government entities, and that it’s negotiated the ability to include national security-related (FISA and National Security Letters) inquiries in the report. Until now, the companies that receive such requests, whether through the recently uncovered PRISM program or not, have not been able to say anything about them, or report how many there are. Still, the stats it’s able to release aren’t specific, and include all requests from the last six months in a range, said to be between 9,000 and 10,000, covering between 18,000 and 19,000 accounts. We still have no official reports on what those inquiries cover, how wide reaching a single one can be or what information has been passed along. Facebook however, is quick to point out that these cover “only a tiny fraction of one percent” of its 1.1 billion active user accounts.
Along with Microsoft and Google, Facebook has publicly petitioned the government to let it be more transparent about the size and scope of the requests it receives, and Reuters reports tonight that “several” internet companies have struck an agreement to do so. Expect more reports to arrive soon in similar formats, however Ullyot states Facebook will continue to push the government to be “as transparent as possible.”
For the six months ending December 31, 2012, the total number of user-data requests Facebook received from any and all government entities in the U.S. (including local, state, and federal, and including criminal and national security-related requests) – was between 9,000 and 10,000. These requests run the gamut – from things like a local sheriff trying to find a missing child, to a federal marshal tracking a fugitive, to a police department investigating an assault, to a national security official investigating a terrorist threat. The total number of Facebook user accounts for which data was requested pursuant to the entirety of those 9-10 thousand requests was between 18,000 and 19,000 accounts.
Filed under: Microsoft, Google, Facebook
Source: Facebook
Bloomberg is reporting that the recent NSA Prism scandal is just a tiny scratch on the privacy surface. Citing "four people familiar with the process", the agency claims that in fact thousands of technology, finance and manufacturing companies work with US national security agencies.
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Spoiler alert: the country that requests the most data from tech companies is the US. We’re number one! We’re number one! This should really be no surprise for anyone who’s been following the news lately but our dominance is actually pretty admirable. Take that you Frenchies! Try to catch us Aussies!
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Facebook announced today that they have opened up their first data center outside the US in Luleå, Sweden. It’s located in a small town at the northern edge of the Baltic Sea, and is just 62 miles south of the Arctic Circle. It’s an odd place for a data center, but Facebook says there are
Google CEO Larry Page and Chief Legal Officer David Drummond made a general call for more transparency in their response to the PRISM revelations last week, and Drummond has gotten quite a bit more specific with that request today. In a post on the company’s Public Policy blog, he says that he’s sent a letter to offices of the Attorney General and the Federal Bureau of Investigation asking that Google be allowed to publish aggregate numbers of the national security requests for data it receives, including FISA disclosures, “in terms of both the number we receive and their scope.” Those numbers, he says, “would clearly show that our compliance with these requests falls far short of the claims being made,” adding, “Google has nothing to hide.” You can find the full letter at the source link below.
Update: Reuters is reporting that Microsoft also wants Uncle Sam to loosen up and let it be more transparent with the “volume and scope” of national security requests and FISA orders. “Our recent report went as far as we legally could and the government should take action to allow companies to provide additional transparency,” Ballmer and Co. added.
Update 2: Hot off the heels of Redmond’s call to the US government, Facebook is voicing similar sentiments regarding increased transparency. “We urge the United States government to help make that possible by allowing companies to include information about the size and scope of national security requests we receive,” read a statement released by the social network.
Filed under: Internet, Microsoft, Google
Source: Google Public Policy Blog, Reuters (1), (2)
Google CEO Larry Page and Chief Legal Officer David Drummond made a general call for more transparency in their response to the PRISM revelations last week, and Drummond has gotten quite a bit more specific with that request today. In a post on the company’s Public Policy blog, he says that he’s sent a letter to offices of the Attorney General and the Federal Bureau of Investigation asking that Google be allowed to publish aggregate numbers of the national security requests for data it receives, including FISA disclosures, “in terms of both the number we receive and their scope.” Those numbers, he says, “would clearly show that our compliance with these requests falls far short of the claims being made,” adding, “Google has nothing to hide.” You can find the full letter at the source link below.
Source: Google Public Policy Blog
AT&T’s GoPhone plans are undergoing a major shakedown, and you’ll get a preliminary taste on June 20th once existing data packages are given the axe. Smartphone users who want internet access on GoPhone’s $25 or $50 plans currently have the option to purchase a 50MB data add-on per month for $5, a 200MB add-on for $15 or a 1GB add-on for $25. Only the $5 option will remain once the changes hit — and we all know having to budget 50MB of data in a month is a sad, sad proposition. Subscribers to the $50 plan have it even worse as they won’t be able to purchase any data add-on at all. Fortunately, the $65 plan that comes with 1GB of data remains untouched.
Things might not be as bad as they seem. When we reached out to AT&T, a spokesperson said:
Beginning June 20, we’re making some changes to our AT&T GoPhone prepaid plans to simplify our offers and better align with what customers are choosing and telling us they want. We’ve begun letting customers know about the changes in advance, and we’ll have more information on new, additional plan options soon.
The mention of “new, additional plans” coming soon gives us hope that the company is introducing new options to make the service more smartphone-friendly once again.
Filed under: Cellphones, Networking, Mobile
Via: CNET
The Internet-using public is no stranger to off-the-wall plans and ideas to stop the so-called blight of copyrighted content sharing, but a new proposal recently submitted to the government is perhaps unlike any before it in terms of craziness. In a report, the Commission on the Theft of American Intellectual Property proposed many ways piracy can be combated, including infecting alleged violators’ computers with malware that can wreck havoc, including and up to destroying the user’s computer.
In the proposal, which spans 84-pages, the Commission stated that software can be pre-installed on computers for the purpose of monitoring and identifying copyright-violating activity, which is comprised of storing, using, or copying such content. If the software detects copyright-violating activities of any of those sorts, it would cause the computer or its files to being locked.
Once the files and/or computer was locked, it would show up with a dialog that requires a password in order to unlock the system, as well as instructions telling the computer user to contact a law enforcement agency, which will have the password necessary to unlock the computer. The obvious part of this being, one will theoretically end up confessing to piracy.
The proposal states that such a method of combating piracy wouldn’t violate any laws, but would “stabilize” an infringement situation and get police involved. While that method is allegedly legal, the next one – which is arguably crazier than the first – is not: deliberately infecting computers with malware designed to do several things, including snapping a picture of the computer user with their webcam without their permission.
The malware would allow companies to gather data off a computer, change data located on the network, and destroy it if it feels such an action is necessary – all without permission, obviously. There’s also suggestions that it could be used to do other things as well, including up to destroying the user’s computer and/or network. We’ll have to wait for the official response on this, but we’re guessing it’ll be something akin to throwing the report against the wall.
SOURCE: The Next Web
Proposal seeks to lock copyright infringing computers, force owners to contact police is written by Brittany Hillen & originally posted on SlashGear.
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