Google executives are under intense pressure to provide governments with the data of its users who are considered to be involved in various criminal activities or in actions aimed at harming the territorial integrity and national security of Western countries.
It is estimated that in the last five years, such requests to Google have increased by 150% and concern users' searches, email accounts and YouTube. The American company made the revelation itself, as part of the "transparency report" that it publishes every six months, according to Agence France-Presse and the New York Times.
In particular, Google's head of legal department Richard Salgado stated that "there was a 15% increase (in requests) compared to the second half of 2013 and a 150% jump since we started publishing the relevant data in 2009." From the US specifically, the corresponding requests increased by 19% and 250%, without counting the related secret requests by the FBI or US special courts for national security reasons.
According to a report in the Financial Times, the German government wants to "squeeze" Google into revealing more details about the famous secret "formula" (algorithm) behind the company's searches. This initiative will certainly please Google's competitors, but the American company is expected to stubbornly refuse.
In an interview with the British newspaper, German Justice Minister Heiko Maas stressed on this issue that Google must become "more transparent" about the algorithm it uses to rank users' search results, as this ranking has significant positive or negative implications for a user, a company or a country.
Source: defencenet.gr
