Trump’s DOJ has received more secret communications from third parties involving Apple

A new report from the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) found that President Donald Trump’s Department of Justice (DOJ) secretly obtained the phone records and messages of 43 employees, two members of Congress in 2017 and 2018 and members of the organization. the media. DOJ prosecutors obtained phone records and documents from telecommunications companies and third-party providers including Apple through subpoenas, search warrants and court orders.

It is already known that President Trump’s DOJ has tried to obtain communications records from Apple as part of an investigation into media leaks about Trump’s communications with Russian officials. The New York Times It was reported in 2021 that one of the petitions filed in 2018 sought to see the accounts of 109 identities including Democratic Representatives Adam B. Schiff and Eric Swalwell of California, congressional aides and family members including a minor. It now appears that the scope of those subpoenas was much wider.

The IG report says prosecutors attached gag orders to the subpoenas to prevent Apple and other companies from notifying their customers about the information orders. Most of the non-disclosure agreements were extended at least once, some of them up to four years. Communication logs only show the names of the parties involved in the calls and messages.

Although the OIG’s report found no political motivation for the prosecutors’ requests, it noted the complaints and other legal means of obtaining communications logs “present alarming risks to the ability of Congress to exercise executive branch control.” The report also says that the DOH failed to call the News Media Review Committee, an advisory committee of the Department of Justice created as part of the overhaul of media policies in 2014, to review its requests for information calling its actions “worrisome,” according to the report. .

Apple also took steps to limit the scope of legal requests following news of subpoenas filed with Reps. Schiff and Swalwell. The technology company has set a limit of 25 identifiers per legal request for customer contact information by 2021.