Microsoft has released its second report on the requests made by the governments for users information. The report covers the period from January to June 2013 and includes information on data requests relating to all of Microsoft’s online and cloud services, including Skype.
According to Microsoft, the company (including Skype) received 37,196 requests from law enforcement agencies, which potentially impacts 66,539 accounts in the first six months of this year. About 77 percent of data requests led to the disclosure of “non-content data”.
“Only a small number of requests result in the disclosure of customer content data, just 2.19 percent of total requests. 92 percent of the requests that resulted in the disclosure of customer content were from United States law enforcement agencies. This is again, broadly in line with what we saw in 2012,” says Microsoft’s Law Enforcement Requests Report.
The report also points out “over 73% of requests coming from five countries, the United States, Turkey, Germany, the United Kingdom, and France”. For Skype, the requests similarly concentrated with four nations namely, the US, UK, France and Germany, which account for more than 70 percent of requests.
While we see requests from a large number of countries, when you look at the overall number, the requests are fairly concentrated with over 73% of requests coming from five countries, the United States, Turkey, Germany, the United Kingdom, and France. For Skype the requests were similarly concentrated, with four countries, the US, UK, France and Germany, accounting for over 70 percent of requests.
India had made 321 user data requests between the period from January to June 2013, leading to disclosure of subscriber/ transactional data for nearly 80 per cent of those requests. The report reveals India had made about 471 user data requests from India for entire 2012 calendar year.
Microsoft’s second report on user data requests follows the ongoing campaign by the Internet companies to promote transparency on the web. Recently, Yahoo published its first-ever transparency report, which reveals a maximum 12,444 requests from the U.S. government. Germany followed with 4,295 requests. India is also in the list with 1,490 data requests.
In the past, Google, Twitter and Facebook have also released reports on requests made by the global governments to access users’ information.
Source: Microsoft