Ron Wyden, a member of the United States Senate from the Democratic party, has written a letter to the US Attorney General requesting disclosure of information from various government agencies and notifications from both Apple and Google.
Wyden stated that he has received information that other governments, besides the US, have also requested such information from both companies. However, when he requested information from both Apple and Google, he received a response stating that they were prohibited by the US government from discussing this request.
Although apps may be encrypted and connected to encrypted servers, most apps still rely on the Push Notification Service provided by Apple or Firebase Cloud Messaging provided by Google. Therefore, the servers of both companies may see messages that are not end-to-end encrypted, such as portions of chats sent in notifications.
Both companies have transparency reports that document various government requests for data disclosure. However, when it comes to national security requests, governments often have laws that prohibit these companies from acknowledging or denying that they have provided data.
App researcher and security expert, Will Strafach, mentioned to Reuters that he had previously been ordered by the US government not to discuss these particular requests. However, now that Wyden’s letter has been publicly disclosed, this information will be included in future transparency reports.
TLDR: Ron Wyden, a United States Senator, has sent a letter to the US Attorney General requesting the disclosure of government agency information and notifications from Apple and Google. Wyden has learned that other governments have made similar requests to both companies, but they were prohibited from discussing it by the US government. This information will now be included in future transparency reports.
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