(Telecompaper) Governments submitted a total of 44,943 data requests to Google in the first half of the year, compared to 40,667 last year, according to the company's latest transparency report. Google noted it is getting more requests as the years pass, partly because its services are getting increasingly used. Governments, courts and investigative and intelligence agencies can submit data requests to Google. Google does not answer all data requests but assesses them in terms of validity.