Government requests for Facebook user data shot up nearly a quarter worldwide in the first six months of 2014 over the second half of last year, a biannual report from the company reveals. Over 40 percent of those requests originated in the United States. Between January and June of this year, governments made 34,946 requests for data globally. During the same period, the amount of Facebook content... 

Previously undisclosed files leaked to the media by former intelligence contractor Edward Snowden now show that the United States National Security Agency has been authorized to spy on persons in all but four countries. The Washington Post published on Monday official documents provided by Mr. Snowden that shows new proof concerning the extent of the NSA’s vast surveillance apparatus. One of the... 

The startling thing about Judge William Pauley III’s opinion is that it reads like an NSA press release or a Tom Clancy script. It begins: “The September 11th terrorist attacks revealed, in the starkest terms, just how dangerous and interconnected the world is. While Americans depended on technology for the conveniences of modernity, al-Qaeda plotted in a seventh-century milieu to use that technology... 

The National Security Agency has publicly admitted to tracking the locations of literally billions of international cell phones under a 1981 executive order. To allay the fears of US citizens, it said the program only targets international phones. Former NSA contractor Edward Snowden first leaked the information that such a practice happens up to 5 billion times each day, and functions by scooping... 

In a closed session, the US Senate Intelligence Committee approved draft legislation that would codify into law the NSA’s bulk collection of domestic telephone metadata. The bill, sponsored by committee chair Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), cements bulk phone metadata collection into the business records provision (Section 215) of the Patriot Act, strengthening NSA surveillance legality allowed under... 

General Keith Alexander, director of the US National Security Agency (NSA) has defended his agency’s surveillance of friendly foreign governments but he said the orders came from American diplomats and policymakers. Gen. Alexander tried to justify the NSA’s programs based on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. He said they only keep the phone calls in addition to their date, time and duration,... 

For years the National Security Agency has been violating restrictions and misusing the US domestic spying program that collected private data from US citizens, newly released declassified documents show. The new information from Intelligence Community Documents Regarding Collection under Section 501 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) shows that the government on a daily basis spied... 

Microsoft’s general counsel has written to the US Attorney General Eric Holder saying that the secrecy regarding the National Security Agency (NSA) surveillance is damaging the “constitutional principles” of America. Microsoft has asked the Obama administration to allow it to share details about how it responds to requests from the US government for user account data. Microsoft’s general counsel... 

Major US internet corporation Yahoo has announced that American law enforcement agencies had made between 12,000 and 13,000 demands for user data over past six months, in the latest case of tech firms admitting to their involvement in the massive US electronic spying bid. In an effort to restore confidence in its users after revelations of the National Security Agency’s (NSA) PRISM electronic surveillance... 

Federal detectives won’t need a warrant to eavesdrop on the emails and phone calls of Americans for another five years. President Obama reauthorized an intelligence gathering bill on Sunday that puts national security over constitutional rights. President Barack Obama inked his name over the weekend to an extension of the FISA Amendments Act of 2008, a George W. Bush-era legislation that has allowed... 

With less than a week until a powerful legislation expires that lets the government eavesdrop on the phone and email conversations of Americans, the Senate has convened in DC to discuss whether or not to renew the FISA Amendment Act. The 2008 FISA Amendment Act, an update to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of the 1970s, allows the government to wiretap any conversation involving US citizens,... 

Retiring US Congressman Ron Paul American Congressman Ron Paul has blasted the US ruling establishment as corrupt, bent on promoting wars, undermining liberties, and assassinating those it considers terrorists. Throughout a 50-minute address to the chamber of the US House of Representatives on Wednesday, the retiring Texas congressman questioned not only the fundamental well-being of his nation’s...