National Security Demands (2014)
The First Amendment empowers us to speak truthfully and frankly about government surveillance. It allows us to tell you about national security demands we have or haven’t received and how we’ve reacted to them.
In this section of our transparency report, we provide information about our receipt and response to national security demands. In the United States, for example, these include national security letters and orders issued by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.
We are pleased to report that we have received zero national security demands to date.
The Justice Department currently takes the position that certain service providers must report the number of national security demands they receive only in large aggregate figures or ranges rather than giving exact numbers. This approach forces companies to tell an inaccurate story about the role they play in government surveillance.
Medium believes the constitution fundamentally protects our right to tell the truth. We intend to give you an accurate accounting of any national security demands we might or might not receive in the future because it is our right to do so.
For more context on national security demands, see:
- The Electronic Frontier Foundation’s page on national security letters:
- The Electronic Frontier Foundation’s FAQ on warrant canaries:
- Twitter’s recent lawsuit against the U.S. government arguing that these restrictions on our ability to speak about government surveillance as unconstitutional under the First Amendment:
