<br>
<div class="cnn_strybtntools">
<a class="cnn_strybtntwttr" id="cnnSBtnTwitterEmbedTop" href="https://twitter.com/intent/tweet?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.cnn.com%2F2012%2F06%2F18%2Ftech%2Fweb%2Fgoogle-transparency-report%2Findex.html&text=Google%20reports%20%27alarming%27%20rise%20in%20government%20censorship%20requests&hashtags=cnn"><img src="http://i.cdn.turner.com/cnn/.e/img/3.0/1px.gif" alt="" border="0"></a>
<a class="cnn_strybtnshr cnnOverlayLnk"><img src="http://i.cdn.turner.com/cnn/.e/img/3.0/1px.gif" alt="" border="0"></a>
<a class="cnn_strybtnem" href="http://www.cnn.com/2012/06/18/tech/web/google-transparency-report/index.html?hpt=hp_t1#"><img src="http://i.cdn.turner.com/cnn/.e/img/3.0/1px.gif" alt="" border="0"></a>
<a class="cnn_strybtnsv" href="http://www.cnn.com/2012/06/18/tech/web/google-transparency-report/index.html?hpt=hp_t1#"><img src="http://i.cdn.turner.com/cnn/.e/img/3.0/1px.gif" alt="" border="0"></a>
<a class="cnn_strybtnprnt" href="http://www.cnn.com/2012/06/18/tech/web/google-transparency-report/index.html?hpt=hp_t1#"><img src="http://i.cdn.turner.com/cnn/.e/img/3.0/1px.gif" alt="" border="0"></a>
</div>
<h1>Google reports 'alarming' rise in government censorship requests</h1>
<div class="cnn_stryathrtmp"><div class="cnn_story_attribution"><table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tbody><tr valign="bottom">
<td style="vertical-align:bottom">
<div class="cnn_story_avatar"><img src="http://i.cdn.turner.com/cnn/.e/img/3.0/sect/tech/avatar/JohnSutter35x35.jpg" alt="John D. Sutter, CNN" border="0" height="35" width="35"></div>
</td>
<td style="vertical-align:bottom">
<div class="cnn_story_author">
<div class="cnnByline">By <strong>John D. Sutter</strong>, CNN</div>
<div class="cnn_strytmstmp">updated 12:31 PM EDT, Mon June 18, 2012 | Filed under: <a href="http://www.cnn.com/TECH/web/archive/" class="cnn_SRLTbbnfltr_4">Web</a>
</div>
</div>
</td>
</tr></tbody></table></div></div>
<div class="cnn_stryimg640captioned"><img src="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/dam/assets/120222113306-reding-google-privacy-story-top.jpg" alt="Google says government requests to take down content are up compared with last year." border="0" height="360" width="640"></div>
<br><p><strong>(CNN)</strong> -- Western governments, including the United
States, appear to be stepping up efforts to censor Internet search
results and YouTube videos, according to a <a href="http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/" target="_blank">"transparency report"</a> released by Google.</p>
<p class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph2">"It's alarming not only
because free expression is at risk, but because some of these requests
come from countries you might not suspect -- Western democracies not
typically associated with censorship," Dorothy Chou, a senior policy
analyst at Google, <a href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2012/06/more-transparency-into-government.html" target="_blank">wrote in a blog post</a> on Sunday night.</p>
<p class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph3">"For example, in the
second half of last year, Spanish regulators asked us to remove 270
search results that linked to blogs and articles in newspapers
referencing individuals and public figures, including mayors and public
prosecutors. In Poland, we received a request from a public institution
to remove links to a site that criticized it. We didn't comply with
either of these requests."</p>
<p class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph4">In the last half of 2011,
U.S. agencies asked Google to remove 6,192 individual pieces of content
from its search results, blog posts or archives of online videos,
according to the report. That's up 718% compared with the 757 such items
that U.S. agencies asked Google to remove in the six months prior.</p>
<a name="em1"></a>
<div class="cnn_strylftcntnt cnn_strylftcexpbx" id="expand15">
<img style="cursor: pointer;" src="http://i2.cdn.turner.com/cnn/dam/assets/120601011659-exp-ns-google-china-00002001-story-body.jpg" alt="" class="box-image" border="0" height="120" width="214"><cite class="expCaption"><span>Fighting the great firewall</span></cite>
</div>
<p class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph5">Overall, Google received
187 requests from United States law enforcement agencies and courts to
remove content from its Web properties from July to December, up 103%
from the 92 requests the Mountain View, California, company received in
the previous reporting period.</p>
<p class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph6">In one incident cited in
the report, a U.S. law enforcement agency asked Google to take down a
blog that "allegedly defamed a law enforcement official in a personal
capacity." The company did not comply with that request.</p>
<p class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph7">In another, a separate
law enforcement group asked Google to take down 1,400 YouTube videos
(Google owns YouTube) because of "alleged harassment."</p>
<p class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph8">And in Canada, the
passport office asked Google to delete a YouTube video "of a Canadian
citizen urinating on his passport and flushing it down the toilet,"
according to the report.</p>
<p class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph9">The tech company did not
oblige either of those requests but did comply at least in part with 42%
of the removal requests from the United States in the last half of
2011, <a href="http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/removals/government/US/?p=2011-12" target="_blank">the report says</a>.
That number is down considerably compared to previous reports; In the
latter half of 2010, for example, Google said it complied with 87% of
U.S. requests to remove content.</p>
<p class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph10">The biannual
transparency report, which includes data to July 2009, also indicates a
rise in world governments' requests to take a look at the data Google
collects about its users. And with those requests, Google tended to be
much more likely to comply.</p>
<p class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph11">In the last half of
2011, Google received 6,321 requests for user data from government
agencies in the United States and complied at least in part with 93% of
them, <a href="http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/userdatarequests/" target="_blank">according to data released in the report</a>.</p>
<p class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph12">Those requests for
information about Google users come as part of criminal investigations,
Google says, and are not unique to the company.</p>
<p class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph13">Google complied more
frequently with U.S.-based requests for information about users than
with requests from other countries, according to the report. It complied
or partially complied with only 24% of such requests from Canada, 44%
from France and 64% from the United Kingdom, for example.</p>
<p class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph14">The number of user data
requests Google received from the United States was up 6% over the
previous six-month period and 37% compared with the last half of 2010.</p>
<p class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph15">Google says this
increase "isn't surprising, since each year we offer more products and
services, and we have a larger number of users." In the report, <a href="http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/userdatarequests/US/?p=2011-12" target="_blank">the company adds</a>:
"We review each request to make sure that it complies with both the
spirit and the letter of the law, and we may refuse to produce
information or try to narrow the request in some cases."</p>
<p class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph16">Writing at Forbes.com, <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/andygreenberg/2012/06/17/u-s-government-requests-for-google-users-private-data-spike-37-in-one-year/" target="_blank">tech columnist Andy Greenberg says</a>
that Google "should be applauded for taking a strong stand against
censorship" but that "the government's increasingly sticky fingers in
Google's databases comes at a sensitive time."</p>
<p class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph17">"Google has been
criticized for failing to reveal much about its reported partnership
with the National Security Agency following a Chinese attack on its
systems in 2010," he writes. "And the company has yet to take a stand on
the House's recently-passed Cyber Infrastructure Security and
Protection Act or its equivalents in the Senate, which are designed to
give companies far more leeway to hand data over to government agencies
for security purposes."</p>
<p class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph18">At Politico, <a href="http://www.politico.com/blogs/media/2012/06/us-increases-internet-removal-requests-126438.html" target="_blank">blogger Dylan Byers says the report</a> "will certainly challenge any notions you might have about a free and unregulated Web."</p>
<p class="cnn_storypgraphtxt cnn_storypgraph19">Google says it hopes the data will offer a "small window into what's happening on the Web at large."</p><br clear="all"><br>-- <br>Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)<br>
<a href="mailto:art.deco.studios@gmail.com" target="_blank">art.deco.studios@gmail.com</a><br>