Reddit Declined to Give Up User Info for 42 Percent of Government Requests

Out of 55 requests for user information, social news aggregator, Reddit, declined to disclose user information 42 percent of the time or about 23 times. According to Reddit’s 2014 transparency report Reddit states that it notifies users whose information is requested to give them a chance to seek legal counsel, unless a court order prohibits them from notifying those users.

On many occasions Reddit revealed that it received requests to produce user information while prohibiting it from notifying users without the legal authority to make such a demand. Without any legal authority to make such demands, Reddit claims it disregards such request.

Reddit produced information for 58 percent of all government and civil requests and 64 percent of all US state and federal government requests.

Reddit admits they receive many illegitimate requests for the removal of user content. Some include the removal of entire subreddits without specific identification of infringing content, user-submitted hyperlinks to content hosted on external non-Reddit controlled websites, and many claims for alleged defamation.

Reddit removed 68 (31 percent) out of the 218 requests for removal of content for copyright and trademark infringement.