Apple says it has put limits on Justice requests, after revelations about Trumps' search for leaks

Apple has tightened some of its rules for responding to legal requests by the Justice Department, the company said after revelations this week about the agency during the Trump administration having subpoenaed data on House Democrats and others to learn the source of leaked government information.

The tech giant said Friday it recently instituted a limit of 25 identifiers such as email addresses or phone numbers per legal request, according to Reuters.

The Cupertino, California-based company also said it received a Justice Department subpoena in February 2018 for information on 109 identifiers, 73 phone numbers and 36 email addresses, but that it did not release to prosecutors content such as emails and pictures.

The New York Times on Thursday reported that federal prosecutors subpoenaed Apple and other online server companies as part of an investigation to sources behind news media reports about contacts between Trump associates and Russia during the 2016 presidential election cycle.

Apple said that it had no way of knowing the nature of the investigation and released only such basic as "account subscriber information" such as names, addresses, email addresses and telephone numbers, in addition to connection logs and IP addresses, Reuters also reports.