Facebook: U.S. demands data on 38K
users


WASHINGTON (AP) — Government
agents in 74 countries demanded
information on about 38,000
Facebook users in the first half of
this year, with about half the orders
coming from authorities in the United
States, the company said Tuesday.
The social-networking giant is the
latest technology company to release
figures on how often governments
seek information about its
customers. Microsoft and Google
have done the same.
As with the other companies, it's
hard to discern much from
Facebook's data, besides the fact
that, as users around the globe
flocked to the world's largest social
network, police and intelligence
agencies followed.
Facebook and Twitter have become
organizing platforms for activists
and, as such, have become targets
for governments. During anti-
government protests in Turkey in
May and June, Turkish Prime
Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan called
social media "the worst menace to
society."
At the time, Facebook denied it
provided information about protest
organizers to the Turkish
government.
Data released Tuesday show
authorities in Turkey submitted 96
requests covering 173 users.
Facebook said it provided some
information in about 45 of those
cases, but there's no information on
what was turned over and why.
"We fight many of these requests,
pushing back when we find legal
deficiencies and narrowing the scope
of overly broad or vague requests,"
Colin Stretch, Facebook's general
counsel company said in a blog post.
"When we are required to comply
with a particular request, we
frequently share only basic user
information, such as name."
Facebook and other technology
companies have been criticized for
helping the National Security Agency
secretly collect data on customers.
Federal law gives government the
authority to demand data without
specific warrants, and while
companies can fight requests in
secret court hearings, it's an uphill
battle.
Facebook turned over some data in
response to about 60 percent of
those requests.
It's not clear from the Facebook data
how many of the roughly 26,000
government requests on 38,000 users
were for law-enforcement purposes
and how many were for intelligence
gathering.
Technology and government officials
have said criminal investigations are
far more common than national
security matters as a justification for
demanding information from
companies.
The numbers are imprecise because
the federal government forbids
companies from revealing how many
times they've been ordered to turn
over information about their
customers. Facebook released only a
range of figures for the United States.
The company said it planned to start
releasing these figures regularly.
http://usatoday.com/article/news/2706071

I'm pretty sure there are people on Facebook in cognito. Not much though because the whole point of Facebook is being identifiable to connect with old acquaintances and family.