Google user info requests for SA criminal investigations

Google received two user data requests for two different users from South Africa for use in criminal investigations during the second half of 2013.

This is according to the latest update to Google’s Transparency Report, released on 27 March 2014, which Google said contains details on the number of requests for user information in criminal investigations during the second half of 2013.

According to the transparency report, none of the user data requests from South Africa produced any data.

Google said that government requests for user information in criminal cases have increased by about 120% since they first began publishing these numbers in 2009.

Though the number of users have grown in this period, Google said that they are also seeing more and more governments beginning to exercise their authority to make requests.

Google said that it consistently pushes back against overly broad requests for personal information, and provided a video which it said explains in simple terms how these requests work:

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