Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court
to relax its gag order on tech
companies targeted in US security
investigations.
The search giant stepped up its
campaign for greater transparency
from the US courts Tuesday in the
wake of the disclosure of the National
Security Agency's top-secret Prism
surveillance program.
The legal filing cites the first
amendment's guarantee of free
speech and follows on from a letter to
attorney general Eric Holder asking for
permission to disclose the number of
requests Google receives under the
foreign intelligence securities act (Fisa).
The Tech firm petitions government to
allow it to publish number of user
accounts affected by secretive court's
requests.
Those requests, targeted at people
outside the US, are dealt with in
secrecy by a dedicated court. Google
is seeking permission to publish the
total numbers of requests the Fisa
court makes and the numbers of user
accounts they affect.
The search firm already publishes a
widely imitated " transparency report "
that documents demands from the US
government and from other
governments worldwide. The report
documents criminal requests and
national security letters, which the
government uses to gather
information about US citizens in the
US. But Google and its peers are
barred from disclosing the number of
Fisa requests they receive.
"Greater transparency is needed, so
today we have petitioned the Foreign
Intelligence Surveillance Court to allow
us to publish aggregate numbers of
national security requests, including
Fisa disclosures, separately," the
company said in a statement.
Apple, Facebook, Microsoft and
Yahoo, the other major tech firms
named in the Prism documents, have
all called for greater disclosure about
government requests for information.
They have also strongly denied that
they allow the government "direct"
access to their servers, denials first
reported by The Guardian when the
story broke.
"Google's reputation and business
has been harmed by the false and
misleading reports in the media, and
Google's users are concerned by the
allegations. Google must respond
with more than generalities.
Moreover, these matters of significant
weight and importance, and
transparency is critical to advancing
public debate in a thoughtful and
democratic manner," Google said in
its court filing.
Co-founder Larry Page and chief legal
officer David Drummond have already
called for the government to act. In a
blog post the pair said the secrecy
surrounding the current system
"undermines the freedoms we all
cherish".
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