NSA snooping: Facebook 'receives 1,500 data requests a month'

Facebook, which recently opened a massive data centre in Sweden, said it had "aggressively" protected its user data from the US government

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Facebook received 9,000-10,000 requests for user data from US government entities in the second half of 2012, the company has revealed.

The social-networking site said the requests covered issues from petty crime to national security.

Leaks by a former computer technician this month suggested the US government ran a much larger electronic spying operation than had been admitted.

The US maintains the programme helps to thwart terrorist attacks.

Facebook's Ted Ullyot said in a post on the company's blog that the requests pertained to a wide range of investigations, including missing children, federal fugitives, local petty crimes and terrorist threats.

Mr Ullyot did not indicate to what extent the company had fulfilled the requests, but said Facebook had "aggressively" protected its users' data.

"We frequently reject such requests outright, or require the government to substantially scale down its requests, or simply give the government much less data than it has requested," he said.

Earlier this month, former computer technician Edward Snowden leaked details of a programme called Prism, run by the US National Security Agency (NSA).

The Guardian and Washington Post newspapers published documents alleging that the NSA said it could directly access the servers of firms including Facebook, Microsoft, Apple and Google.

The firms denied the accusations, saying they gave no such access but did comply with lawful requests.

Mr Snowden, 29, fled the US to Hong Kong shortly before the newspapers published his revelations.

His whereabouts are unknown, and he has vowed to fight extradition to the US should the authorities attempt to prosecute him.