Google: Governments seek more about you than ever
http://news.cnet.com/8301-27080_3-20125483-245/google-governments-seek-more-about-you-than-ever/
by Elinor Mills October 25, 2011 3:38 PM PDT
A new report from Google shows a rise in government requests for user
account data and content removal, including a request by one unnamed
law enforcement agency to remove YouTube videos of police
brutality--which the company refused.
The latest Google Transparency Report, released today, also shows
historic traffic patterns on Google services via graphs with spikes
and drops indicating outages that, in some cases, indicate attempts by
governments to block access to Google or the Internet. For instance,
all Google servers were inaccessible in Libya during the first six
months of this year, as was YouTube in China.
But the truly interesting data are the statistics on requests made to
the company by governments for either access to user data or to remove
content.
Some countries had large amounts of user data requests. The United
States leads that pack, with 5,950 such requests pertaining to more
than 11,000 users or accounts, and to which Google complied 93 percent
of the time. That's up from about 4,600 requests in the second half of
last year. Other countries seeking lots of user data were India (more
than 1,700 requests involving more than 2,400 accounts), France, the
United Kingdom, and Germany. Google says it complied most of the time
in those cases, except in France.
The actual numbers are likely larger than what is reported because
Google is prohibited by law from revealing information on requests
from intelligence agencies such as the National Security Agency or
FBI, notes online privacy advocate Chris Soghoian, who released a
report on law enforcement surveillance earlier this year.
"Google doesn't say how many of the thousands of requests they get a
year are compelled (via a formal legal process) and how many are
emergency requests," which they aren't obligated to comply with, he
said. "This is where Google could truly demonstrate its commitment to
privacy...We know that Verizon gets 90,000 requests a year, and 25,000
are emergency requests for which there is no court order. It's likely
Google is getting a similar percentage."
But Soghoian commended Google on providing the figures on the numbers
of accounts that officials are seeking information from in addition to
the number of requests. "This is a useful data point because one
request could be for 50 accounts," he said. "It's great that Google is
providing this."
Also of note in the report were the attempts by governments to get
Google to remove content, from YouTube videos to blogs to ads. Google
said it received 29 percent more requests for user data from
government sources during the first half of this year than during the
previous six months, and 70 percent more requests to remove content in
that period. The report called out the request to remove YouTube
videos of police brutality and separate requests from an unnamed
different law enforcement agency to remove allegedly defamatory
videos, but it said those requests were denied.
In the United States, Google said it received 92 requests to
cumulatively remove 757 items, and complied fully or partially in 63
percent of the cases. That compared to 54 requests in the second half
of last year. There were 24 court orders related to Web searches, and
26 police or executive requests related to YouTube.
Thailand asked Google to remove 225 videos for allegedly insulting the
monarchy, and in response, Google restricted Thai users from accessing
90 percent of the videos. Google also restricted Turkish users' access
to some videos but denied a majority of requests from India to remove
videos of protests or videos using offensive language in reference to
religious leaders. And when asked by China to remove more than 120
items from Google services, the company declined in nearly all of the
cases.
Meanwhile, content removal requests from U.K. officials rose by more
than 70 percent. User data requests were up 28 percent in Spain, 38
percent in Germany, 27 percent in France, and 36 percent in South
Korea.
Google is hoping to lead by example, and Soghoian called out other
companies for not releasing this information too.
"There is simply no excuse for Microsoft, Yahoo, Twitter, and Facebook
not to provide the same data," he said. "These firms monetize our
data, and they don't want to give us any reason or cause for concern
about entrusting them with our data, but they all need to step up and
follow Google's lead."
Asked why Google releases the data, spokeswoman Christine Chen told
CNET: "We actually believe being transparent about these numbers can
contribute to public discussion about how policies affect access to
information on the Internet...We really believe in transparency and
free flow of information."
In a blog post on the report, Dorothy Chou, senior policy analyst at
Google, suggested that the ultimate goal with the report is to
encourage more user-friendly policies.
"We believe that providing this level of detail highlights the need to
modernize laws like the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, which
regulates government access to user information and was written 25
years ago--long before the average person had ever heard of e-mail,"
she wrote. "Yet at the end of the day, the information that we're
disclosing offers only a limited snapshot. We hope others join us in
the effort to provide more transparency, so we'll be better able to
see the bigger picture of how regulatory environments affect the
entire Web."
The company participates in the OpenNet Transparency Project, an
effort to provide an easy way for companies to share data on
government information requests. That project is part of the OpenNet
Initiative, whose goal is to "investigate, expose, and analyze
Internet filtering and surveillance practices."
Google began releasing information about government requests for user
data and content removal in early 2010, and it aims to release such
data every six months.
Elinor Mills
Elinor Mills covers Internet security and privacy. She joined CNET
News in 2005 after working as a foreign correspondent for Reuters in
Portugal and writing for The Industry Standard, the IDG News Service,
and the Associated Press.
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