Automattic, the company behind content management and blogging platform WordPress, has complained that it can't reveal the full extent of state intelligence agencies' requests to probe users' accounts.
The company's new National Security report reports that the company's recorded zero “national security requests” in 2015's first six months. But the report then offers this observation:
The post goes on to say “By preventing us from sharing a more precise number of requests, the current disclosure rules diminish the trust that our users place in us and our services. For now, we are disclosing the maximum amount of information allowed by law.”
Automattic's unhappy with that so has joined the Twitter-initiated effort (PDF) to get the US attorney-general to change the rules in order to allow more detailed reporting of intelligence agency requests.
That effort could take years to resolve, so until it does it seems safest to assume that even though companies list small quantities of intelligence agency action, the reality may be rather different. ®
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 29 2015, @03:02AM
Zero is actually a very precise number. So by saying that they are prevented from being more precise, doesn't that mean, what else could it mean? Now all we need to know if what state intelligence agency was doing this. I suspect Italy, North Korea, and Namibia, but that also is very imprecise.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 29 2015, @03:23AM
(Score: 3, Informative) by fishybell on Wednesday July 29 2015, @03:51AM
Them saying 0 is still being very precise even if it is inaccurate. </pedantic>
(Score: 2) by darkfeline on Wednesday July 29 2015, @04:03AM
You misunderstand. They are not saying that they have received precisely zero requests, but that they have received imprecisely, somewhere around zero requests, more or less. What's a half dozen digits between friends, eh?
Join the SDF Public Access UNIX System today!
(Score: 2) by Whoever on Wednesday July 29 2015, @04:28AM
Try RTFA, if you look at 2013, it says that they received between 0 and 249 requests between Jul 1 and Dec 31 of that year.