Microsoft recently revealed the latest end-user data request figures in its Law Enforcement Requests Report for the first six months according to which it received 37,196 global requests for user data from various law enforcement agencies.
The figure clearly indicates that Microsoft may very well receive the same amount of government data requests as it did in 2012 during which it received more than 75,000 requests. According to the latest data request report from Microsoft, over 70 percent of data requests emanated from five countries – France, Germany, Turkey, the UK and the US.
According to the Windows 8 maker, its Law Enforcement Requests Report reveals how the company responded to the requests made to it and how it is “valuable and useful to the community” as the report tries to balance between both privacy and law enforcement needs.
The current report discloses that only 2.19 percent of the request revealed actual customer content while around 92 percent requests were made by the United States government. Microsoft revealed that in case of 21 percent request, it did not hand over any data to the requesting agency.
The information about national security-related requests made by the U.S. government agencies under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) have not been included in the report as it is would be illegal on Microsoft’s part to report any information about national security orders or requests they receive.
Considering the end-user data requests which Microsoft received from other countries apart from the top 5, India accounted for around 321 requests. For 2012, 421 user data requests were received by Microsoft (including Skype) from India. The company found subscriber data for only 80.6 percent of the requests, with no data for 16.2 percent cases. Microsoft rejected 3.3 percent of the Indian requests.
