Twitter has sued the U.S. government over the right to make public the extent of the social media site’s fulfilled requests provided for U.S. national security purposes.
In a formal complaint filed last week, Twitter explained that it wants to publish detailed figures on how many Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) orders and National Security Letters (NSLs) it receives from the government.
But the Department of Justice has expressed opposition to the idea, arguing that the information is classified.
But Twitter accuses the government of not fully admitting to the scope of its surveillance of social networks, and of “unconstitutionally restrict[ing]” companies from providing its own data and perspective.
FISA orders and NSLs are how the government secretly gathers intelligence on what it considers national security threats. Recently, the government allowed several tech companies to publish data about how many of these requests they receive, but only in very broad ranges.
But Twitter believes it has a constitutional right to publish detailed figures, and that forcing it to be vague about the data violates the First Amendment.
“It’s our belief that we are entitled under the First Amendment to respond to our users’ concerns and to the statements of U.S. government officials by providing information about the scope of U.S. government surveillance – including what types of legal process have not been received,” said Twitter in a statement.” We should be free to do this in a meaningful way, rather than in broad, inexact ranges.”
Comments