Report: Reddit complies with over half of government requests for user data

Following in the footsteps of Google, Facebook, and other tech behemoths, Reddit released its first transparency report this week, providing a glimpse into how the site handles government requests for its users’ information.

Notably, the hugely popular site received only 55 requests for data on 78 of its 174 million regular visitors in 2014. This number is minuscule compared to the 32,000 requests received by Google and the 35,000 received by Facebook in just the first six months of that year, according to the New York Times. Of those 55 government requests, Reddit actually turned over data in only 32 of those (58 percent).

“We regularly get requests from governments and law enforcement agencies for private information about our users,” said the Reddit administrators in a blog post. “These requests are usually legitimate; we push back on any that we view as overbroad or unnecessarily invasive of privacy.”

In addition to the small number of requests received, the transparency report also shows that Reddit has never received a National Security Letter, another striking contrast to Facebook and Google. Reddit promised to disclose to the public if it ever does receive one. Tech companies were actually barred from such disclosures until 2013.

Slightly more prevalent for Reddit this past year were requests to remove user information, mostly due to alleged trademark or copyright violations. The site received 218 of such requests, and complied with only 68 of them (31 percent).

“As with law enforcement requests, real humans examine each and every content removal request we receive,” said the Reddit admins. “We rejected many copyright takedown requests because they did not include the information required by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.”

 

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