Facebook reports spike in government requests for data

By Yasmeen Abutaleb and Sudarshan Varadhan SAN FRANCISCO/BANGALORE (Reuters) - Facebook Inc said in a report on Wednesday that government demands for its user data surged in the first half of 2015, taking a trend that began at least two years ago when the company started revealing such requests to new heights. Government access to personal data from telephone and Web companies has become a contentious privacy issue since former spy agency contractor Edward Snowden revealed surreptitious surveill