Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) has just released a new public report with updated information about the number of information requests it receives from government officials. The full report is available on Apple’s website.
Apple breaks down government requests
The company listed each of the nations it receives requests for information from. Of course it should be no surprise that the U.S. leads by far in terms of the number of cases in which it requested information from Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL). There isn’t even an exact number there, but just a range: between 1,000 and 2,000 requests from law enforcement affecting between 2,000 and 3,000 Apple accounts.
U.S. officials won’t even allow Apple to release the exact numbers. Apple isn’t even allowed to say exactly how many times it objected to providing information to U.S. officials or how many user accounts it ended up disclosing information for. All of those columns simply have a range of between zero and 1,000. How very “transparent” of the government to allow that tidbit of information (or lack, thereof).
Apple fights for more transparency
Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) stated in its report that it opposes this lack of transparency forced upon it by the government and that it has repeatedly brought up the subject with officials in an attempt to be allowed to release more information. The company said it believes talking with officials about transparency is better than filing a lawsuit against the government.
Apple isn’t the only tech company battling the government for greater transparency regarding information requests. Facebook Inc (NASDAQ:FB), Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ:YHOO), Google Inc (NASDAQ:GOOG) and Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) have all been involved in this fight for most of this year.
How the U.S. stacks up against other nations
The next closest nation in terms of the number of information requests was the U.K. with 127 requests. Spain was third with 102 requests. U.S. officials also requested information about 3,542 Apple devices, which again is must more than the number requested by other countries. The next highest is Germany, which requested information on 2,156 devices.
