Twitter report shows rise in government data requests.

• Position: PRIVACY - Brief article

Information requests on Twitter users are at an all-time high, according to a transparency report released by Twitter.

According to the report, 4,363 information requests from 62 nations were made between January 2015 and June 2015, with four previously unlisted countries (Cyprus, Dominican Republic, Poland, and Serbia) joining the pool of governments seeking information from the social media giant. The Twitter report states, "information requests include worldwide government requests we've received for account information, typically in connection with criminal investigation," and of the requests that Twitter received, about 58% resulted in the release of information.

The first half of 2015 marked a 53% spike in the number of requests made by governments...