Twitter to put US government in the dock over surveillance requests
Twitter has won the right to press ahead with a lawsuit demanding that the US government discloses more details about surveillance requests it issues to technology firms after a judge gave his consent for the case to be brought.
Twitter to put US government in the dock over surveillance requests
In a written order district Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers in Oakland, California, asserted that officials had failed to demonstrate ‘clear and present danger’ when gagging Twitter over surveillance requests it made – in breach of the social platforms constitutional right of free speech.
Rogers stated: “The government's restrictions on Twitter's speech are content-based prior restraints subject to the highest level of scrutiny under the First Amendment.”
Welcoming the decision Twitter chief Jack Dorsey tweeted that his firm was ‘continuing its fight for more transparency’, specifically by ending the legal limits on the details which tech firms can divulge relating to national security requests.
Twitter is continuing its fight for more transparency under the First Amendment https://t.co/TG6wPSoMnP
— Twitter Policy (@Policy) July 6, 2017
Twitter’s lawsuit dates back to 2014 when renegade NSA contractor Edward Snowden first revealed the extent of collusion between authorities and America’s biggest tech firms, prompting a scramble to rebuild public trust.
The US justice department said only that it would review the decision with a hearing on the case scheduled for next month.