It has been reported by The New York Times that Yahoo apparently fought a court order before it joined National Security Agency’s PRISM program. Details about this top secret program came to light a week back when some documents were leaked by former CIA technical analyst, Edward Snowden. The report claims that Yahoo petitioned U.S. Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court in 2008 to review an order that it believed violated its users’ Fourth Amendment rights that protect against unresonable search. However, the court ruled that Yahoo’s concerns over these rights were “overblown” and that “incidentally collected communications of non-targeted United States persons do not violate the Fourth Amendment.” On the other hand Yahoo, like other major U.S. internet companies, has denied ever being part of the PRISM program.
The court further added that to substantiate its case, Yahoo did not present “evidence of actual harm, any egregious risk of error, or any broad potential for abuse.” The company itself hasn’t commented on this alleged order or its battle against it in court. There has been much debate over NSA’s PRISM program, which the U.S. National Director of Intelligence calls ‘lawful,’ over the past week. It has also been suggested that perhaps these companies have set up secure portals through which NSA accesses data without even having to tell said companies.