US tech companies have been rallying support for social networking site Facebook in the wake of bulk search warrants issued by the New York State Supreme Court.

Last July the Manhattan district attorney (DA) applied for and secured a set of warrants regarding 381 Facebook accounts in relation to an ongoing investigation into social security fraud.

Facebook handed over the person data of the 381 on trial in June – of which 62 were later charged – which it is now contesting.

The group of US tech companies standing behind Facebook include giants including Google, Microsoft and Twitter.

Yesterday lawyers for Foursquare, Kickstart, Meetup and Tumblr said they were backing the support for Facebook.

The social networking site also gained support from the New York Civil Liberties Union and American Civil Liberties Union.

The two unions submitted a brief to the New York Supreme Court in which it states the court case against Facebook deeply implicates the Fourth (the right to be secure) and First (freedom of expression) Amendments to the federal constitution.

Gagging social media
To stop Facebook informing those involved in the social security investigastion, Manhattan’s DA obtained a gagging order of unlimited duration.

The DA removed the gag order after it was clear Facebook would argue its unconstitutionality in an appeal.

Last August Facebook requested the court quash the warrants for violating the Fourth Amendment and challenged the gag order as a violation of the First Amendment and the federal Stored Communications Act.

In June Facebook’s deputy general counsel Chris Sonderby said in a company blog that the government’s gag orders prohibited the company from discussing the case and notifying any of the people affected.

“We’ve gone to court and repeatedly asserted that these overly broad warrants–which contain no date restrictions and allow the government to keep the seized data indefinitely–violate the privacy rights of the people on Facebook and ignore Fourth Amendment safeguards against unreasonable searches and seizures,” Sonderby said.

“We fought forcefully against these 381 requests and were told by a lower court that as an online service provider we didn’t even have the legal standing to contest the warrants. We complied only after the appeals court denied our application to stay this ruling, and after the prosecutor filed a motion to find us in criminal contempt.”



Facebook's responses after court demands

NSA aftermath
Since the NSA revelations were made public by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden last year the US government has been keeping a watchful eye on the storage of sensitive data.

International firms have been publishing detailed transparency reports in which the public can get a detailed insight into the legal framework of the company and how many government requests the company has received in various countries worldwide.

Facebook currently has two reports detailing the number of requests it has received from the US government.

The social network splits the requests into two sections – US law enforcement requests for data and US national security requests for data.

For the period between July to December 2013 the company received a total of 12,598 requests and 18,715 user/accounts from US law enforcement.

Regarding search warrants the total requested for that period was 5,814 with 9,122 user/accounts requested also.

Microsoft v US court
Microsoft has also recently been under pressure to hand over data stored in its Dublin data center following an order from a New York Court.

The company was forced to turn over customer emails and account information stored in the Irish facility – in which it argued that US search warrants should end at US borders and not be carried over to other countries.

In June Microsoft general counsel and EVP Brad Smith posted in a company blog that although the US government had made some initial positive reforms there was a long was to go.

Smith highlighted five things he would like to see the US government do including ending bulk collection of data, recognizing US search warrants should end at US borders and commit not to hack data centers or cables.

The ongoing battle between the US government and courts and the tech industry has no immediate end in sight but, Sonderby made one thing clear for Facebook.

“We will continue to fight on your behalf, and we recognize the importance of this responsibility,” Sonderby said.