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Facebook gov slurp rise

The number of requests from governments for Facebook user records increased 13 per cent from the first half of 2015 to the second half of the year, we're told.

According to the social network's latest transparency report, cops and g-men asked for people's account data 46,763 times in the six months to December 31.

"Approximately 60 per cent of the requests we received for user data from authorities in the United States contained a non-disclosure order that prohibited us from notifying the user," Chris Sonderby, Facebook's deputy general counsel, noted on Thursday.

The site was also asked to take down or restrict access to 55,827 items posted by users, up from 20,568 in the first half of 2015. These items tend to be photos that are banned in certain countries, and Facebook is asked to remove them from sight. Sonderby explained:

The increase in restricted content in this half is almost entirely due to one photo related to the November 2015 terrorist attacks in Paris. The photo was alleged to violate French laws related to protecting human dignity. We restricted access to more than 32,000 copies of the photo, in France only, in response to a legal request from the French government.

In the US, there were 19,235 requests for information on 30,041 users, and 81 per cent of the time, at least some data was handed over.

In the UK, 4,190 requests were made against 5,478 accounts, and 82 per cent of requests were successful in some way. "We restricted access to 97 items in compliance with legal requests from the Gambling Commission," Facebook added.

See the full report for a breakdown of requests. ®

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