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twitter snooping
Governments want your personal information more than ever
The majority of requests for Twitter users’ information now come from the US, Japan and Turkey.
GOVERNMENT REQUESTS FOR Twitter users’ personal data jumped by 52% this year, according to the social network’s latest transparency report.
Twitter said government agencies made some 4,363 requests for information during the first half of 2015, up from 2,871 in the previous six months.
Jeremy Kessel, the company’s senior manager of global legal policy, said it was the largest ever increase between its twice-yearly reports.
The US was behind the majority of requests (56%), followed by Japan (10%), Turkey (9%) and the UK (7%).
Irish authorities made one request in relation to two accounts in the first half of the year.
This was a decrease from the same period last year, when it submitted three requests for information about a total of four accounts.
Twitter said removal requests and copyright notices also grew by 26% and 11% respectively in the first six months of 2015.
The company’s transparency report, which it began publishing in 2012, covers data requests from the governments of 62 countries.
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