Amazon Still Won't Talk About Government Requests For User Data
from the usually,-silence-speaks-volumes,-but-in-this-case,-just-more-silence dept
In the wake of the Snowden leaks, more and more tech companies are providing their users with transparency reports that detail (to the extent they're allowed) government requests for user data. Amazon -- home to vast amounts of cloud storage -- isn't one of them.
Amazon remains the only US internet giant in the Fortune 500 that has not yet released a report detailing how many demands for data it receives from the US government.Zack Whittaker and ZDNet ran into the same wall. Nearly thirty Amazon representatives were contacted but only one provided a response: an anonymous statement that the company was under "confidentiality obligations" not to discuss requests for data.
Although people are starting to notice, the retail and cloud giant has no public plans to address these concerns.
Word first spread last week when the ACLU's Christopher Soghoian, who's spent years publicly denouncing companies for poor privacy practices, told attendees at a Seattle town hall event that he's "hit a wall with Amazon," adding that it's "just really difficult to reach people there."
There are several reasons why Amazon might be hesitant to share intel/law enforcement request data, perhaps none bigger than its $600 million/10-year contract with the US intelligence community. It might also be its multiple contracts with other federal agencies, including connecting the nation's law enforcement agencies through its AWS-hosted Criminal Justice Information Service.
But that can't be the whole explanation. It's not as if other companies now providing transparency reports aren't similarly engaged with the government at some level.
Microsoft has contracts with various governments to provide Windows and Office software. Google offers a range of open-source and cloud-based services to the government, and Apple provides iPhones and iPads to government and military users, thanks to earning various certifications.Even telephone service providers, which have historically been very proactive in accommodating government demands for data -- going so far as to give intelligence analysts guidance on how to skirt legal restrictions -- are producing bi-annual transparency reports. But Amazon simply refuses to do so, and then refuses to explain its refusal.
This lack of transparency has gone past the point of being merely vexatious. Amazon isn't satisfied with simply selling and storing. It's gathering far more data than its more famous offerings would indicate.
With its smartphone and tablet line-up, the company is taking on even more data -- including browsing history through its Silk browser, reading habits, and other data like IP addresses. The company is slated to be moving into the enterprise and work-based email provider space.Silence and secrecy aren't improving Amazon's reputation, at least not with those with privacy concerns. Unfortunately for them, it's been well-established that Amazon will do whatever it wants with little regard for public opinion. No one's going to "guilt" Amazon into doing anything. But the concerns are legitimate. Who wants to be housed "next door" to the CIA, knowing it has shown little respect for data barriers put in place to safeguard other government entities? I'm sure the answer is "hardly anybody," but Amazon's opacity prevents ordinary people from knowing even the slightest about the government's activities and demands.
Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Filed Under: government requests, jeff bezos, transparency, transparency reports
Companies: amazon
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
Is that management speak for being under a gag order?
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
It's management speak for: "go f*** yourself"
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Amazon and Wikileaks
http://aws.amazon.com/message/65348/
I have not used Amazon since the company's anti-Wikileaks crusade was revealed in 2010, a personal decision that did not require any kind of organized boycott.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Amazon won't respond to abuse reports either
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Amazon won't respond to abuse reports either
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Amazon won't respond to abuse reports either
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Well, it's better than the LIES Google puts out implying it's defending your rights!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Well, it's better than the LIES Google puts out implying it's defending your rights!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Well, it's better than the LIES Google puts out implying it's defending your rights!
I don't like PR stunts when Google is said by Snowden to give NSA "direct access". You obviously aren't good at detecting lies.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re: Well, it's better than the LIES Google puts out implying it's defending your rights!
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Amazon just wants to be left alone
A couple extra things:
* The public and government networks are (very) separate.
* If the government wanted in, they would be in anyway (look at Google).
* As a public cloud provider, of course there are people using it for bad. Same goes for any other public technology advancement. Some bad, mostly good.
Source: I used to work in AWS
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Amazon just wants to be left alone
Source: I can see logs that shows the attacks from aws, and I can add, amazon does not care.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Amazon just wants to be left alone
Then it's failing. Silence implies complicity.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re:
Minimizing exposed information is an approach I've found useful.
When browsing eBay or Amazon, I do it anonymously through my VPN, which I leave on for almost everything anyway. When I am ready to buy, I boot to a Live CD, log on briefly, and make the specific purchase I had already selected.
When the Live CD is shut down, there is no possibility of leaving a history on my computer. The computer I use for financial transactions has no hard disk that could be corrupted by viruses or trackers.
Amazon of course has a complete historical database of everything I ever actually purchased there. But it has no record of the far-more-revealing searches, comparisons, and time spent on each that could be used to (mis)interpret in-depth personal preferences and decision mechanisms. I also avoid use of any other Amazon service, which would only add more personal data to the purchase history database.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: Re:
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
hard to get ahold of anyone
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Re: hard to get ahold of anyone
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
[ link to this | view in chronology ]