Microsoft: We Offer Up User Data To Law Enforcement 2 Percent of the Time

Nerval's Lobster writes "In its second announcement of the kind, Microsoft revealed [Friday] that it received more than 37,000 requests for information on customers of its Skype, Azure and other services from law enforcement agencies around the world. The count does not include requests made using "National Security Letters" issued by the FBI or other U.S. federal agencies that have the force of a warrant or subpoena, albeit without the oversight or control provided by the courts that issue those sorts of orders. During the first six months of 2013, Microsoft received 37,196 requests that covered a total of 66,539 customer accounts. The company refused to provide any information in response to 21 percent of those requests. It provided "non-content data" in response to 77 percent of the requests – non-content data usually includes information such as names or basic subscriber information rather than information on the content of messages or other details describing online activity of those customers. In 2.19 percent of cases, however, Microsoft reports having provided "customer content data" – which includes the content of messages or data stored in accounts owned by Microsoft companies. Ninety-two percent of requests for customer content came from U.S. law-enforcement agencies."

Comments

Stop this artificial distinction of 'metadata'

[Anonymous Coward]

What the summary actually says is that they offer up user data to law enforcement 77% of the time.

Metadata was provided in 77% of requests

[guanxi]

Even Slashdot's editors don't know the value of metadata, calling it "non-content data", at least on the front page post? Click through the link and read the sub-headline: "Microsoft provided metadata in 77 percent of more than 37,000 law-enforcement requests for information".

Your metadata is as valuable as the content. Otherwise, why would the NSA and Facebook invest so much in it?

Re:Metadata was provided in 77% of requests

[guanxi]

From Microsoft's FAQ:

Non-content data refers to basic subscriber information, such as the e-mail address, name, location and IP address captured at the time of registration. Below is an example of exactly what law enforcement receives when Microsoft produces basic subscriber information, using a test account registered by a Microsoft employee. Although we changed the name and are masking the extension for security reasons, all other information is exactly what Microsoft produces to law enforcement.
Field Value
Login First.Last@xxxxxxx.com
PUID 0006BFFDA0FF8810
First Name First
Last Name Last
State Washington
Zip 98052
Country US
Timezone America/Los_Angeles
Registered from IP 65.55.161.10
Date Registered {Pacific} 10/24/2007 1:05:18 PM
Gender M
Last Login IP 64.4.1.11

The PUID in the above table stands for âoePersonal User ID,â which is a unique alpha-numeric code generated for each registered Microsoft account. Other non-content data may include IP connection history, an Xbox Gamertag, and credit card or other billing information. We require an official, document based request, such as a subpoena, before we will consider disclosing non-content data to law enforcement.