Following disclosures from Microsoft and Facebook last Friday, Yahoo and Apple are releasing information on thousands of requests they have received for user data related to criminal and security investigations from law enforcement and the U.S. National Security Agency.
Requests for user data that investigative agencies in the U.S. made to Yahoo from Dec. 1, 2012, to May 31 numbered between 12,000 and 13,000, including both criminal requests and those under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which is the authority the NSA uses to seek information. Yahoo said the most common requests for user data concerned fraud, homicides, kidnappings and other criminal investigations. Yahoo did not specify how many user accounts were involved in the requests.
"Democracy demands accountability," Yahoo said in a statement authored by CEO Marissa Mayer and General Counsel Ron Bell. "Recognizing the important role that Yahoo can play in ensuring accountability, we will issue later this summer our first global law enforcement transparency report, which will cover the first half of the year. We will refresh this report with current statistics twice a year.
"As always, we will continually evaluate whether further actions can be taken to protect the privacy of our users and our ability to defend it. We appreciate -- and do not take for granted -- the trust you place in us."
Apple Data Requests
For Apple, from Dec. 1, 2012, to May 31 the company received between 4,000 and 5,000 requests from U.S. investigative agencies for customer data. Between 9,000 and 10,000 accounts or devices were specified in those requests, which came from federal, state and local authorities and included both criminal investigations and national security matters. Apple said the most common form of request came from police investigating robberies and other crimes, searching for missing children, trying to locate a patient with Alzheimer's disease,...
