Facebook Government Data Requests Up 24%

This article originally appeared on 60 Second Social.

Requests by governments for Facebook data from users is up 24% compared to the previous 6 months. News of the increase comes as Facebook is fighting its largest ever court order to hand over data from 400 people.

Photographs, messages and other information involving people in a benefit fraud trial were given to a New York Court last year but the request was only made public in August. The world’s largest social network said that they “scrutinize” every government request for legal sufficiency and “push back hard when we find deficiencies or are served with overly broad requests.”

Facebook has faced multiple privacy concerns over the years, probably more than any other of their social network counterparts. Just last month Facebook also had to admit that it would change how they do research after an experiment was revealed which manipulated users feeds to affect their emotions.

The social media giant as rolled out features this year to help users protect themselves and their personal information which is shared with third party apps.

In 2012, Facebook had settled privacy charges with US authorities over a case that it had deceived users and forced them to share more personal information than they had intended.

In September, Google reported a 15% increase in the number of requests in the first half of this year compared to the prior six months, and a 150% rise in the last five years, from governments around the world to reveal user information for criminal investigations.

Governments want to know more about people and it seems that they are increasingly turning to social media data to try and find the answers.

About The Author

Mark is the founder of 60 Second Social media where he provides social media news and digital marketing analysis, he is also a proud father of his bearded dragon, Lola. You can follow him on Twitter here. You can also follow 60 Second Social on Twitter here.