Meta Received Over 270,000 User Data Requests Worldwide in Early 2023

In the first half of 2023, Meta (designated as an extremist organization and banned in some countries) received 271,692 requests for user data from around the world. The company complied with 76.9% of these requests. These requests concerned 469,372 accounts. For comparison, in the second half of 2022, there were 239,388 requests related to 415,642 accounts.

The highest number of requests came from the United States (74,000 requests concerning 125,000 accounts), India (70,600 requests; 119,000 accounts), and Brazil (23,800 requests; 77,300 accounts). Only one request came from Russia, related to two accounts, and it was not fulfilled. In the previous reporting period, there were three requests from Russia.

Requests from Russia

From January to June 2023, Meta also received about 200,000 requests to restrict access to content based on local laws. (For comparison, there were about 123,000 such requests in the second half of 2022.) Most of these requests concerned posts (121,000) on Facebook and content (37,400) on Instagram. Argentina submitted 36,200 requests, Mexico 35,000, and Taiwan 27,400. There were no requests from Russia during this period (compared to 1,720 requests in the first half of 2022).

Background on Russia

In 2022, Russia declared Meta (the parent company of Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp) an “extremist organization.” Since then, Facebook and Instagram have been blocked in the country.