By Steve Neavling
Ticklethewire.com

Google alerted dozens of people or more that the search engine giant was ordered by the FBI to release user data as part of an unspecified investigation.

The news site Motherboard indicated that the “unusual notice appears to be related” to a hacking tool called LuminosityLink. 

Several people reported receiving the email and posted the information on popular social media platforms and HackForums, a popular source of information about hacking and cybersecurity.

“Google received and responded to legal process issue by Federal Bureau of Investigation (Eastern District of Kentucky) compelling the release of information related to your Google account,” the email read, according to people who said they received it.

A lawyer who specializes in cybercrimes said it appears Google was eventually given permission to notify users.

“It looks to me like the court initially ordered Google not to disclose the existence of the info demand, so Google was legally prohibited from notifying the user. Then the nondisclosure order was lifted, so Google notified the user. There’s nothing unusual about that per se,” the lawyer, Marcia Hoffman, told Motherboard in an online chat. “It’s common when law enforcement is seeking info during an ongoing investigation and doesn’t want to tip off the target(s).”

Special Counsel Robert Mueller, via FBI.

By Steve Neavling
Ticklethewire.com

Special counsel Robert Mueller delivered both good and bad news to President Trump’s lawyers, who for months have been trying to prevent an interview between prosecutors and Trump over of concerns that he will perjure himself.

In a letter to the president’s lawyers Friday, Mueller said he will accept – for now – written answers to questions about whether Trump or his campaign colluded with Russia to interfere with the presidential election in 2016, the Los Angeles Times and New York Times report, citing people familiar with the correspondence. 

But calls by the president’s attorneys to end the special counsel investigation before mid-term elections appeared to be nothing more than fantasy. The letter indicates that Mueller plans to continue investigating Russian collision and may still seek an in-person interview over allegations that Trump obstructed justice by interfering with the federal probe.

“He said he’d assess it down the road,” one person familiar with the letter about Mueller, the Los Angeles Times reported. “They’re essentially saying, ‘We’ll deal with this at a later date.’”

In other words, Mueller’s team is keeping open the investigation until some unspecified time, without acquiescing to White House demands.