Earlier this week, media reported that the social media giant had provided police with private messages that helped to charge a mother for helping her daughter have an abortion in Nebraska, sparking outrage.

Jessica Burgess, 41, is accused of helping her 17-year-old daughter have an abortion.

She is the subject of five charges, one of which is directly linked to a law passed in 2010 in this Midwestern state, which bans abortion after 20 weeks of pregnancy.

Her daughter faces three counts, including concealment and abandonment of a corpse.

Both women pleaded not guilty last week, according to reports.

Women's rights activists warned, after the US Supreme Court's decision to revoke the constitutional right to abortion, of the danger posed by the mountains of data accumulated by tech companies on their users.

Meta, Facebook's parent company, defended itself on Tuesday, noting that the court's warrant "did not mention abortion at all" and was issued before the Supreme Court's about-face.

This line of defense "seems to insinuate that *if* the search warrant had mentioned abortion, the result would have been different. But this is obviously false", tweeted Logan Koepke, a researcher who studies the impact of technology in particular. on criminal justice.

Contacted by AFP, the company highlighted its policy of responding favorably to requests from the authorities when "the law requires it".

Abortion restrictions in the state of Nebraska had been enacted long before Roe v.

Wade, which protected access to abortion since 1973. Some 16 other American states also limit, or prohibit, abortions in early pregnancy.

Encrypted messaging

For many observers, the Nebraska affair will not remain an isolated case.

“It will continue to happen to companies that have a lot of data on people in the country and around the world,” says Alexandra Givens, from the NGO Center for Democracy & Technology.

According to the latter, firms faced with legal requests formulated in the rules have an interest in responding to them.

But "companies should at least make sure they demand a full legal process, that warrants are specific and not sweeping, that searches are rigorously worded, and that users are warned so they can try to fight them." , adds Alexandra Givens.

Police had asked the judge to order Meta not to notify Ms Burgess' daughter of the search warrant relating to her Facebook posts, citing a risk of "destruction or alteration of evidence".

The police officer behind the request told the court he began investigating in late April following "concerns" that the 17-year-old may have given birth prematurely to a "stillborn child ", which she and her mother would then have buried together.

To ensure that their communications remain out of reach of the authorities, Internet users can for example use encrypted messaging, note activists.

At Meta, the WhatsApp application provides end-to-end encryption, which means that the company does not have access to the contents of the messages, but this level of confidentiality is not activated by default on Facebook Messenger.

"The company has never indicated that it will not comply with law enforcement requests when it comes to abortion," said Caitlin Seeley George of the NGO Fight for the Future, which defends digital rights.

"If users were using encrypted messaging, Meta wouldn't even be able to share conversations," she adds.

© 2022 AFP