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Facebook and Microsoft have struck agreements with the US government to release limited information about the number of surveillance requests they receive, a modest victory for the companies as they struggle with the fallout from disclosures about a secret government data-collection programme.
Facebook yesterday became the first to release aggregate numbers of requests, saying in a blog post that it received between 9,000 and 10,000 US requests for user data in the second half of 2012, covering 18,000 to 19,000 of its users' accounts. Facebook has more than 1.1 billion users worldwide.
The majority of those requests are routine police inquiries, a person familiar with the company said, but under the terms of the deal with Justice Department, Facebook is precluded from saying how many were secret orders issued under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. Until now, all information about requests under FISA, including their existence, were deemed secret.
Microsoft said it had received requests of all types for information on about 31,000 consumer accounts in the second half of 2012. In a "transparency report" Microsoft published earlier this year without including national security matters, it said it had received criminal requests involving 24,565 accounts for all of 2012.
If half of those requests came in the second part of the year, the intelligence requests constitute the bulk of government inquiries. Microsoft did not dispute that conclusion.
Google yesterday said it was negotiating with the government and that the sticking point was whether it could only publish a combined figure for all requests. It said that would be “a step back for users,” because it already breaks out criminal requests and National Security Letters, another type of intelligence inquiry.
Facebook, Google and Microsoft had all publicly urged the US authorities to allow them to reveal the number and scope of the surveillance requests after documents leaked to the Washington Post and the Guardian suggested they had given the government “direct access” to their computers as part of a National Security Agency programme called Prism.
The disclosures about Prism, and related revelations about broad-based collection of telephone records, have triggered widespread concern and congressional hearings about the scope and extent of the information-gathering.
The big Internet companies in particular have been torn by the need to obey US laws that forbid virtually any discussion of foreign intelligence requests and the need to assuage customers.
“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,” Facebook wrote on its site.
Facebook said it would continue to press to divulge more information. The person familiar with the company said that it at least partially complied with US legal requests 79 per cent of the time, and that it usually turned over just the user’s email address and Internet Protocol address and name, rather than the content of the person's postings or messages.
It is believed that FISA requests typically seek much more information. But it remains unclear how broad the FISA orders might be.
Several companies have said they had never been asked to turn over everything from an entire country, for example. However, the intelligence agencies could ask for all correspondence by an account holder, or even all correspondence from the users' contacts.
Among the other remaining questions are the nature of court-approved “minimisation” procedures designed to limit use of information about US residents. The NSA is prohibited from specifically targeting them.
“If they are receiving large amounts of data that they are not actually authorised to look at, the question then becomes what are the procedures by which they determine what they can look at?” said Kevin Bankston, an attorney at the Center for Democracy & Technology. “Do they simply store that forever in case later they are authorised to look at it?”
In addition, some legal experts say that recent US laws allow for intelligence-gathering simply for the pursuit of foreign policy objectives, not just in hunting terrorists and spies.
Google, Facebook and Microsoft have already directly contradicted the Guardian and Washington Post reports about “direct access” to their servers.
HISTORY OF SURVEILLANCE IN THE US
Government surveillance and secret warrants are not new in the US, particularly in the years since the September 11, 2001, attacks. A look at key milestones in the history of surveillance in the country:
- 1919 - The US Department of State quietly approves the Cipher Bureau, also called the ‘Black Chamber’— a precursor to the modern-day National Security Agency
- 1945 - The US creates Project SHAMROCK, a large-scale spying operation designed to gather all telegraphic data going in and out of the country
- 1952 - President Harry Truman secretly issues a directive to create the National Security Agency to consolidate surveillance activities after World War II
- 1976 - Senator Frank Church leads a select committee to investigate federal intelligence operations. Its report detailed widespread spying at home and abroad
- 1978 - Senator Church's report results in Congress passing the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) of 1978
- 2001 – After the September 11 attacks on the US, President George W Bush signs on a secret NSA domestic spying programme
- 2003 - Congress votes to shut down the Pentagon Information Awareness Office, host of the proposed Total Information Awareness Program, after public outcry
- 2005 – Backlash against the government’s domestic surveillance programme, after the extent of President Bush's NSA spying policy is revealed
- 2006 - USA Today reports NSA has worked with telecommunications companies in its warrantless eavesdropping programme
- 2007 - Congress passes the Protect America Act, which amends FISA and expands the government's warrantless eavesdropping authority
- 2008 - Bush oversees passage of further amendments to FISA, giving telecommunications companies immunity if they cooperate with NSA wiretapping
- 2012 - The issue of domestic spying reappears after Senator Ron Wyden is asked to reveal procedures of the government's surveillance programme had been found “unreasonable” by FISC
- 2013 - Obama defends the surveillance, following media reports authorities had gained access to personal emails and files through major technology companies
