Twitter releases first report on gov't requests for user information

03.07.2012
Twitter released a report on Monday about the user information requests it has received from governments this year and how it responded to them.

The shows that the U.S. government asked for information on far more users than any other country. Between Jan. 1 and June 30, Twitter received 679 requests for information from American authorities pertaining to 948 users.

Japan came in a distant second, with 98 information requests concerning 147 users.

Most Twitter users are in the United States, according to data in January by Semiocast. Japan has the third-largest user base, after Brazil. Twitter noted that some requests may have targeted the same users or nonexistent users.

Twitter provided all or part of the information requested in 75 percent of the cases initiated by the U.S. government. It provided information in response to half the requests from the Netherlands and a third of the requests from Japan and Australia.

Most requests were in connection with criminal investigations or cases, Twitter said. The number of requests in 2012 has already exceeded the total for all of 2011, it said.