Fergie's Tech Blog

AOL: 'We Did Not Comply With All of the DOJ's Search Data Request'

As my father always told me,"In for a penny, in for a pound."

Via Boing Boing.

Yesterday, I asked Justice Department spokesperson Charles Miller which search companies other than Google the administration sought search data from, back in 2005. Mr. Miller said that in addition to Google -- which has refused to provide the requested information -- AOL, Yahoo, and MSN were also asked, and those three companies complied. Andrew Weinstein, Vice President of Corporate Communications at America Online, tells Boing Boing:

I saw in your posting that the DOJ is indicating that AOL complied with their subpoena for user search records last fall. That is not accurate.

We did receive a subpoena from the DOJ last fall, but we did not comply with the requests made in that subpoena. Instead, we gave them a list of aggregate and anonymous search terms that did not include any results nor any personally-identifiable information.

posted by Fergie @ 1/20/2006 04:24:00 PM