Since 2012, Twitter has been publishing the Twitter Transparency report a biannual transparency report covering government requests and copyright notices. Twitter released the Half year 2015 report, which also included announcements of expansion of the service to include two new sections: trademark notices and email privacy practices. In the report, Twitter revealed it received a 52% increase in the number of requests by for account information by governments. In the period, Twitter received 4,363 requests for information from law enforcement authorities. During the same period, copyright notices increased 11-percent, and removal requests increased 26-percent.
The United States led the list of making most of the requests for account information constituting 56% of all the requests received. It was followed by Japan with 10% then Turkey with 9%, The United Kingdom made 7% of the total requests. India’s requests jumped 175% to 113 requests with only 19% of them offering any significant information. Interestingly, Twitter’s newest acquisition received 1,391 copyright take down requests since its launch in March.
Kenya also appeared on the list. Seems like the government is not keen on taking down user accounts or any Twitter user data as there were no official requests made to the social networking site. Unlike in the period ending December 2014, when there was one account take down request from the government to which, Twitter complied. In the 2015, Who Has Your Back? 2015: Protecting Your Data From Government Requests report by The Electronic Frontier Foundation, Twitter received 4-stars for not complying with governments in their requests for user information. The metrics of best practices used in the report include security, publicly opposing back doors, disclosing government data demands, content removal requests, and making data retention policies public.
