Following the lead of other tech giants like Microsoft, Yahoo, and Apple, Verizon Communications on Wednesday published its first transparency report, detailing government requests for information about its customers.

In 2013, Verizon received approximately 320,000 requests for customer information from federal, state, and local law enforcement in the U.S., the company said. In comparison, Microsoft received just over 37,000 requests first six months of 2013 while Yahoo received 12,444 during the same six-month period, and Apple got between 1,000 and 2,000.

Verizon said the "vast majority" of the requests it received related to consumer customers. The company got "very few" demands regarding its enterprise customers.

"We do not release customer information unless authorized by law, such as a valid law enforcement demand or an appropriate request in an emergency involving the danger of death or serious physical injury," Verizon said. "Overall, we saw an increase in the number of demands we received in 2013, as compared to 2012."

Breaking it down, Verizon received approximately 164,000 subpoenas, 70,000 court orders, and 36,000 warrants from U.S. law enforcement last year. The company also received 85,116 emergency requests and between 1,000 and 2,000 National Security Letters.

Verizon said it is forced to provide contents of communications, such as text messages and emails, "relatively infrequently."

"Verizon only releases such stored content to law enforcement with a warrant; we do not produce stored content in response to a general order or subpoena. Last year, we received approximately 14,500 warrants for stored content," the company said.

Law enforcement may also gain access to content as it is taking place through a wiretap order, which they did about 1,500 times last year, Verizon said. In addition, Verizon last year received about 35,000 demands for location data, and about 3,200 warrants or court orders for "cell tower dumps" or a list of all the phone numbers that connected to a specific cell tower during a given period of time.

Though Internet firms like Yahoo and Facebook have released transparency reports, Verizon is among the first telecom provider to do so. The company became embroiled in the ongoing NSA surveillance scandal last year when leaked documents from Edward Snowden said that Verizon was required to hand over phone metadata on all its customers over a three-month period.

The controversy recently prompted President Obama to propose a change to the way the NSA collects phone metadata, though nothing has been put in place just yet.

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