The social media website Twitter released their biannual transparency report on Thursday, suggesting the number of government requests have raised in recent years.
According to a blog post by Manager of Global Legal Policy Jeremy Kessel, government requests for information have risen 66% in the past two years. Most of these requests come from the governments of Saudi Arabia, Japan, and the United States.
“The majority of global government requests for account information still come from the U.S. government (59% in the latest report).”
The Washington Post reports that while Twitter was not one of the tech companies shadowed by the NSA program, they have been harshly condemned the surveillance giant that had secured information from Microsoft, Google, and Facebook. As of now the company is unable to assess the individual accounts affected by the government requests. Kessel and the company believe this “violates our First Amendment right to free expression and open discussion of government affairs.”
Recently the three companies affected by the NSA program reached a settlement with the Justice Department releasing requests made to them by the FISA court that manages said requests. Though victories, the Twitter representative believes the war is far from over.
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