Just a few weeks after U.S. District Judge Susan Illston created a bit of legal limbo around the U.S. federal government’s so-called National Security Letters (NSLs) by declaring them unconstitutional and putting her ruling on hold to allow for appeal, Google has stepped into the breach by refusing to comply with an FBI-issued NSL. According to a Bloomberg report, Google has challenged a demand by the FBI for private user information in what the Electronic Frontier Foundation believes is the first time a “major communications company” has decided not to comply with an NSL. Google outlines its policy toward NSLs here. The law allows judges to set aside requests by the FBI if they are “unreasonable, oppressive or otherwise unlawful.”
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