The Info Law Enforcement Gets When They Subpoena Facebook

by Mike Masnick
Techdirt
May. 05, 2011

With the US government looking for software that will let them manage fake profiles on social networks, in order to "infiltrate" groups, you might have forgotten that they can also take the easy way out and issue a subpoena. While Julian Assange is certainly being hyperbolic with his claims that "Facebook... is the most appalling spying machine that has ever been invented," it is worth remembering that the US government can access all sorts of info from Facebook. The Next Web has a the details of what kind of info Facebook provides law enforcement on the receipt of a valid subpoena. Of course, this certainly doesn't mean Facebook is handing over this kind of info willy-nilly (this isn't AT&T we're talking about here...). Also, none of this is a huge surprise, but just a reminder that Facebook likely has a lot of info about you, and when put together, could allow the government to collect a pretty detailed dossier on certain aspects of your life:

Once Facebook has the form submitted, they will then prepare an archive for the police to review. That archive will include the following.

User ID number

Email address

Date and Time of your account’s creation

The most recent logins, usually the last 2-3 days

Your phone number, if you registered it

Profile contact info

Mini-feed

Status update history

Shares

Notes

Wall posts

Friends list

Groups list

Future and past events

Videos

Photos

Private messages

IP logs (computers and locations you logged in from)

You’ll notice that this list includes just about everything that you’ve posted to Facebook. In addition, it also includes a list of your Friends, which you didn’t technically add to Facebook yourself.

Again, there's nothing surprising here, but when laid out directly, it may make some people realize that relying so much on a third party like Facebook to manage such a large part of your life also opens yourself up to certain risks.