WikiLeaks is demanding explanations after learning that the emails and digital data belonging to three of its employees reached the FBI, courtesy of Google.

More specifically, back in March 2012, Google responded to a secret search warrant and handed over to the FBI the emails and digital data of three WikiLeaks employees, and remained quiet about it up until recently.

It was only on Dec. 23, 2014, that Google informed WikiLeaks of this situation. This means that Google has kept quiet about the whole thing for nearly three years, during which the WikiLeaks employees in question had no idea their data had been handed over to the government.

"The US government is claiming universal jurisdiction to apply the Espionage Act, general Conspiracy statute and the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act to journalists and publishers - a horrifying precedent for press freedoms around the world. Once an offence is alleged in relation to a journalist or their source, the whole media organisation, by the nature of its work flow, can be targeted as alleged 'conspiracy'. Julian Assange, WikiLeaks Editor-in-Chief said: 'WikiLeaks has out endured everything the Obama administration has thrown at us and we will out endure these latest "offences" too,'" WikiLeaks states in a press release on Monday, Jan. 26.

WikiLeaks has written a letter to Google executive chairman Eric Schmidt, demanding explanations and asking the company to list all of the materials it handed over to the FBI. In the same letter, WikiLeaks asks whether Google did anything to challenge the warrants, or whether some other such data demands are yet to come to light.

"Mr. Schmidt, on Dec. 23, 2014 Google sent notifications to our clients Sarah Harrison, Kristinn Hrafnsson and Joseph Farrell, journalists and editors for the publishing organization WikiLeaks, that pursuant to search and seizure warrants Google provided federal law enforcement officials all of their Google e-mail content, subscriber information, metadata, and other content," reads the letter. "We are astonished and disturbed that Google waited over two and a half years to notify its subscribers that a search warrant was issued for their records."

WikiLeaks further points out that this extensive delay could have severely affected the three employees' chances to protect their privacy.

"Had Ms. Harrison, Mr. Hrafnsson, or Mr. Farrell been aware of such proceedings they could have intervened and protected their interests including their rights to privacy, association and freedom from illegal searches. While it is too late for our clients to have the notice they should have had, they are still entitled to a list of Google's disclosures to the government and an explanation why Google waited more than two and a half years to provide any notice."

WikiLeaks is asking Google for a list of all materials it disclosed or provided to law enforcement in response to search warrants, a copy of the court order referenced in Google's emails to WikiLeaks' clients, as well as any other legal process or communications related to these warrants.

Google, for its part, reportedly had its arms tied in this matter. When it finally notified the WikiLeaks employees last month, the company said it had been unable to disclose this matter earlier because a non-disclosure order had been imposed. The gag order was eventually lifted, but Google did not mention just when exactly.