Facebook Releases Data, Including All National Security Requests

[deminks]

http://newsroom.fb.com/News/636/Facebook-Releases-Data-Including-All-National-Security-Requests

June 14, 2013

By Ted Ullyot, Facebook General Counsel

Over the last week, in press statements as well as Mark’s post last Friday, we’ve repeatedly called for governments worldwide to be willing to provide more details about programs aimed at keeping the public safe. We’ve also urged them to allow companies to divulge appropriate information about government orders and requests that we receive, in a manner that does not compromise legitimate security concerns.

(snip)

Since this story was first reported, we’ve been in discussions with U.S. national security authorities urging them to allow more transparency and flexibility around national security-related orders we are required to comply with. We’re pleased that as a result of our discussions, we can now include in a transparency report all U.S. national security-related requests (including FISA as well as National Security Letters) – which until now no company has been permitted to do. As of today, the government will only authorize us to communicate about these numbers in aggregate, and as a range. This is progress, but we’re continuing to push for even more transparency, so that our users around the world can understand how infrequently we are asked to provide user data on national security grounds.

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.

With more than 1.1 billion monthly active users worldwide, this means that a tiny fraction of one percent of our user accounts were the subject of any kind of U.S. state, local, or federal U.S. government request (including criminal and national security-related requests) in the past six months. 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.

(end snip)

https://twitter.com/BreakingNews

[Whisp]

1. I don't think will sound intrusive enough, or Big Brother enough

someone better change those numbers to suit the Hair on Fires.

[flamingdem]

7. I'm waiting for someone to say Mark Zuckerberg is

DLC

[The Magistrate]

2. Interesting, Sir

Hopefully there will be more, from other companies.

[snooper2]

11. I've been trying to educate people here how it's ridiculous that the government is

"trakin' all me phone calls!" and "gettin' all me email and kitty pictures!"


After all the facts come out I expect everyone who is going ape-shit to just, "quiet down", as the ones did with the IRS "targeting political parties"...

"They do it to repukes, repuke get in power they do it to me!!!"



They all just kind of, went to the lounge or something LOL

[railsback]

3. The hairs on fire will say this is a lie

like the Righties scoffing at Obama's birth certificate.

Yeah, works both ways.

[Skip Intro]

4. What a charade. If you don't think everyting you do on FB is monitored,

then you should familiarize yourself with the definition of gullible.

[Whisp]

8. that is a good comment

but not all facebook accounts are 'public' - now I don't know how private anything is, probably not much, but what exactly and how do those requests work and what are they getting that we don't see as just members.

hmmm.

[Skip Intro]

9. Was a recent story about Facebook monitoring your browsing AFTER you logged out.

I was going to post that but I couldn't find it with one or two tries but it is true. I think FB apologized and said it was some accident or something. But moving forward....bla bla bla.

I don't trust them with my info. I've got friends with their entire life history posted for anyone to see, every move they make logged via their cell phone. Sadly, FB has kind of put together a friend suggestion list for me that is starting to strike a little close to home. They really, really want to know where I went to High School, because they ask me repeatedly in bigger and bigger pop-ups. They REALLY want my personal information.

I once got a message from facebook, on some dummy account I'd set up, that they didn't think my name was real, and that my account was being deleted. And off that account went.

It isn't just them. I can barely log into Gmail or Yahoo Mail wihtout being asked for my phone number, with a small link somewhere on the bottom of the screen that reads something like, "not now.

Trust these people not to be spying on you (monitoring you without permission) - ?

No way.

[snooper2]

12. come on that doesn't past muster

You can't say,

"I tried to find it a little, but didn't, but it's TRUE!"


Evidence Prosecutor!

[Skip Intro]

14. Oh it is.

I'll look for the link later.

In the meantime feel free to believe me or not as you wish.

[snooper2]

16. I'm trying to start new rules

[Whisp]

13. Here is that link to that FB story you mention:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10023019373

and no, I don't trust FB at all. I don't know why i'm even on it - been thinking of quiting for ages but haven't. I don't post much of anything, just a few toons here and there but I still feel creeped out and shake my head at some of the things people post that might come back and haunt them in a way they can't comprehend today.

So when the NSA requests to get info from FB, I guess FB has kind of a dossier on every user - wherever you go, what games you play, who your friends are, who you unfriend, Everything about you in one file, that just by being a member you could not access. Plus, as you mentioned, what you do when you log off. I think that is how it would work then. Jesus.

[BeyondGeography]

5. But hyperbolic and false assertions are such fun

Rec'd

[Sunlei]

6. anytime(except with actual death threats) the user should be informed if their info is handed out.

not just facebook, all companies, phone, utilities,ISP,messageboards,mailing lists,creditcard,bank card use,banking info, the user should be informed.

I'll go one step further, any company gathering 'shopping' 'surfing habits' info by use of tracking info/cookies- should pay the user for tracking them.

[Phillip McCleod]

10. old news and it doesn't change a damn thing.

some of the same people who are freaking out about the NSA are freaking out about the NSA on Facebook.

the irony hurts.

[BlueCheese]

15. Interesting.

Why did it take this controversy to release such numbers, which don't seem to reveal anything dangerous? In this case, the secrecy probably did more to stoke concern than the actual numbers.

Also, it's a little odd that they couldn't release just the number of national security requests. Of the 18,000 to 19,000 people whose data was accessed, how many were ordinary law enforcement and how many were national security? Surely the first number can't be secret (though it may be now, given that it will reveal the second).

19,000 people would probably be 1 in 8000 Facebook users in the U.S.

[nadinbrzezinski]

17. These are separate from the verizon order for example

And I am told I am confusing programs.