Twitter wants the US government to permit greater transparency about the requests for information it receives for national security purposes, the social networking platform said on Friday.

“In light of ongoing revelations about government surveillance, we’ve taken a public stand in support of increased transparency and global government surveillance reform,” the company said in a blog post.

Twitter noted that the US Department of Justice reached an agreement last week allowing limited disclosure of national security requests.

Twitter called that a step in the right direction, but said it did not “provide meaningful or sufficient transparency for the public.” There has been a steady increase in information requests from governments around the world since 2012, about 60 per cent of which come from the United States, Twitter said.

comment COMMENT NOW