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每日英語跟讀 Ep.K211: Tech Giants Are Plunged Into Political Firestorm
On Feb. 6, 2018, Apple received a grand jury subpoena for the names and phone records connected to 109 email addresses and phone numbers. It was one of the more than 250 data requests that the company received on average from U.S. law enforcement each week at the time. An Apple paralegal complied and provided the information.
2018年2月6日，蘋果公司收到一份大陪審團傳票，要求提供和109個電郵地址及電話有關的名字與通聯紀錄。當時蘋果收到來自美國執法單位的提供資料要求，平均每周超過250件，這份傳票只是其一。一名法律助理遵令並提供了相關資訊。
This year, a gag order on the subpoena expired. Apple said it alerted the people who were the subjects of the subpoena, just as it does with dozens of customers each day. But this request was out of the ordinary.
關於這份傳票的一項緘口令今年到期，蘋果公司說，他們向身為傳票目標的人發出警示，如同每天處理數十名顧客的做法。但是，這項要求並不尋常。
Without knowing it, Apple said, it had handed over the data of congressional staffers, their families and at least two members of Congress, including Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., then the House Intelligence Committee’s ranking member and now its chair. It turned out the subpoena was part of a wide-ranging investigation by the Trump administration into leaks of classified information.
蘋果表示，在不知情的狀況下，它交出了國會員工、其家人以及至少兩名國會議員的資料，包括眾議院情報委員會前副主席、現任主席謝安達。原來，這份傳票是川普政府追查機密資訊外洩一項大範圍調查的一部分。
The revelations have now plunged Apple into the middle of a firestorm over the Trump administration’s efforts to find the sources of news stories, and the handling underscores the flood of law enforcement requests that tech companies increasingly contend with. The number of these requests has soared in recent years to thousands a week, putting Apple and other tech giants like Google and Microsoft in an uncomfortable position between law enforcement, the courts and the customers whose privacy they have promised to protect.
此事曝光，讓蘋果陷入川普政府試圖找出新聞報導消息來源的風暴中，而其處置方式，顯示科技公司一直不斷應付執法單位的大量要求。這些要求的數量近年增加至一周數千件，讓蘋果及谷歌、微軟等科技巨擘處於麻煩立場，夾在執法單位、法院還有他們曾經承諾保護其隱私的顧客之間。
The companies regularly comply with the requests because they are legally required to do so. The subpoenas can be vague, so Apple, Google and others are often unclear on the nature or subject of an investigation. They can challenge some of subpoenas if they are too broad or if they relate to a corporate client. In the first six months of 2020, Apple challenged 238 demands from the government for its customers’ account data, or 4% of such requests.
這些公司通常會服從要求，因為依法必須如此。傳票內容可能很含糊，所以蘋果、谷歌和其他公司通常不清楚調查的性質或主題。如果傳票範圍太廣或是和某個企業客戶有關，他們可以提出異議。在2020年的前六個月，蘋果對政府要求取得其顧客帳號數據提出238項異議，占了這類要求的4%。
As part of the same leak investigation by the Trump administration, Google fought a gag order this year on a subpoena to turn over data on the emails of four New York Times reporters. Google argued that its contract as The Times’ corporate email provider required it to inform the newspaper of any government requests for its emails, said Ted Boutrous, an outside lawyer for The Times.
在同一個川普政府的洩密調查中，谷歌今年對緘口令提出異議，相關傳票要求交出四名紐約時報記者電郵數據。谷歌主張，根據其作為紐時企業電郵服務供應商的合約，政府任何取得電郵資料的要求皆須通知該報。
But more frequently than not, the companies comply with law enforcement demands. And that underlines an awkward truth: As their products become more central to people’s lives, the world’s largest tech companies have become surveillance intermediaries and crucial partners to authorities.
但是，這些公司多半會順從執法單位命令，而這凸顯一個棘手事實：隨著他們的產品逐漸成為人們生活中心，這些世界最大科技公司已成為當局的偵察工具和關鍵夥伴。Source article: https://udn.com/news/story/6904/5560507