It looks like Apple aren’t the only company the government are trying to force to hand over data.
Yesterday Reddit published its latest transparency report and it suggests the social networking site received a classified request for user information from the U.S. government in the last year, reports The Verge.
This latest report has removed what is known as a ‘warrant canary’ – a confirmation that Reddit has not received a classified request – that was present in the previous year’s report.
This is as close as they can legally come to admitting they did receive such a request without breaching the ‘gag orders’ they come with.
The previous report included a line that stated:
As of January 29, 2015, Reddit has never received a National Security Letter, an order under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or any other classified request for user information.
However, the company also said that if it did receive a request, it would try to let the public know about it, so it is widely believed that the removal of the ‘warrant canary’ is Reddit’s attempt to do just that.
Reddit founder Steve Huffman – posting under the username ‘spez’ – said as much as he could:
I’ve been advised not to say anything one way or the other, even with the canaries, we’re treading a fine line.
I think we all know what that means…
