Yahoo Gets Huffy over Leak of Spying Price List

Posted 12/07/2009 at 6:36am | by Paul Lilly

2

Comments

Print

The topic of privacy frequently comes up, but it really hits home when a major online portal draws up a detailed list of all the online activities it's able to keep tabs on. Of course, you were never meant to see the menu of spying services Yahoo provides to law enforcement agencies, but now that someone has provided a copy to whistleblower site Cryptome, anyone can take a look.

The document is 17 pages long and describes in detail both Yahoo's data retention policies and surveillance capabilities. It even includes a price list of sorts, listing out the average cost of reimbursement it would seek in responding to subpoena requests.

Yahoo isn't the only site to have its data retention policies show up on Cryptome. The site has also published similar documents from Cox Communications, SBC, Singular, Nextel, GTE, and several other telecoms and service providers. That bit comes as little consolation to Yahoo, who's team of lawyers have issued a DMCA takedown notice to Cryptome.

According to Yahoo's legal team, posting the portal's Compliance Guide for Law Enforcement at Cryptome engages in "business interference" and could help criminals evade surveillance.

As of right now, the document remains online (and probably always will thanks to mirrors), which you can read right here.