Twitter says espionage charge likely if company doesn’t comply with DOJ’s ‘unconstitutional’ order

Twitter’s attorneys said in court papers filed Tuesday that it believes theJustice Department would bring espionage charges against the social media service if it publicly reveals how many of its users have been subject to government surveillance.

By evoking the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), the U.S. government is able to compel internet companies like Twitter for the records of account holders under the guise of national security. Through guidelines established in 2014, however, companies are prohibited from saying exactly how many of those requests they receive, and instead are only permitted to report the number of orders in ranges of 1,000.

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