Google – AFP, Rob Lever (AFP), 28 January 2014
 |
Civil
liberties activists hold a rally against surveillance of US citizens
in
Washington on January 17, 2014 (AFP/File, Nicholas Kamm)
|
Washington
— The United States agreed to give technology firms the ability to publish
broad details of how their customer data has been targeted by US spy agencies,
officials said.
Facing a
legal challenge and a furious public debate, Attorney General Eric Holder and
Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said the companies would now be
allowed to disclose figures on consumer accounts requested.
"The
administration is acting to allow more detailed disclosures about the number of
national security orders and requests issued to communications providers,"
the officials said in a joint statement Monday.
 |
US
President Barack Obama speaks
about the National Security Agency
and
intelligence agencies surveillance
techniques in Washington, DC on
January 17,
2014 (AFP/File, Jim Watson)
|
President Barack Obama's administration has faced pressure from the tech sector following leaked documents outlining vast surveillance of online and phone communications. The companies have said the reports have already begun to affect their business.
Facebook,
Google, LinkedIn, Microsoft and Yahoo, which sued for the right to publish more
data, said in a joint statement they were pleased with the settlement.
"We
filed our lawsuits because we believe that the public has a right to know about
the volume and types of national security requests we receive," the
companies said.
"We're
pleased the Department of Justice has agreed that we and other providers can
disclose this information. While this is a very positive step, we'll continue
to encourage Congress to take additional steps to address all of the reforms we
believe are needed."
Under the
agreement filed with the secretive Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court the
companies will be able to disclose the numbers, within ranges.
They will
have an option to reveal within bands of 1,000 the numbers of "national
security letters" and specific court orders. Another option will be to
disclose, in bands of 250, all the national security requests, lumped together.
The reports
will have a six-month lag time, so data for the second half of 2014 may be
published in mid-2015, according to the agreement.
Previously,
the existence of orders made by the secret for access to private online data
was itself classified, to the outrage of the firms.
In addition
to the bare numbers of targeted consumers, the companies will also be permitted
to disclose the number but not the nature of selection criteria for broader
Internet sweeps.
Civil
liberties groups welcomed the deal, while arguing for even more transparency.
"This
is a victory for transparency and a critical step toward reining in excessive
government surveillance," said Alex Abdo, an ACLU attorney.
But Abdo
said more is needed: "Congress should require the government to publish
basic information about the full extent of its surveillance, including the
significant amount of spying that happens without the tech companies'
involvement."
Kevin
Bankston of the New America Foundation's Open Technology Institute, called the
news "an important victory in the fight for greater transparency around
the NSA's surveillance programs" but said the agreement "falls far
short of the level of transparency that an unprecedented coalition of Internet
companies, privacy advocates and civil liberties organizations called for this
summer."
"Meaningful
transparency means giving companies the ability to publish the specific number
of requests they receive for specific types of data under specific legal
authorities," Bankston said.
 |
A picture
taken on October 26, 2013
shows a portrait of Edward Snowden
declaring him a
"hero" during a protest
against government surveillance in
Washington, DC (AFP/File, Mandel
Ngan)
|
"Fuzzing
the numbers into ranges of a thousand -- and even worse, lumping all of the
different types of surveillance orders into a single number -- serves no
national security purpose while making it impossible to effectively evaluate
how those powers are being used."
US tech
firms have claimed that reports on the US government's secretive data
collection programs have distorted how they work with intelligence and law
enforcement. The firms have been asking for permission to disclose more on the
nature of the requests and what is handed over.
Google's petition
said that despite reports to the contrary, the US government "does not
have direct access to its servers" and that it only complies with
"lawful" requests.
The issue
caught fire after Edward Snowden, a former IT contractor at the National
Security Agency, revealed that US authorities were tapping into Internet user
data.
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