US Government: You Don't Own Your Cloud Data So We Can Access It At Any Time

New submitter jest3r writes "On Tuesday the EFF filed a brief proposing a process for the Court in the Megaupload case to hold the government accountable for the actions it took (and failed to take) when it shut down Megaupload's service and denied third parties access to their property. Many businesses used Megaupload's cloud service to store and share files not related to piracy. The government is calling for a long, drawn-out process that would require individuals or small companies to travel to courts far away and engage in multiple hearings just to get their own property back. Additionally, the government's argument that you lose all your property rights by storing your data on the cloud could apply to Amazon's S3 or Google Apps or Apple iCloud services as well (see page 4 of their filing)."

Comments

Flipside

[areusche]

Does this mean that all of those copyrighted works I am hosting "in the cloud" are no longer the property of their respected copyright holders? I can see this being argued in all sorts of funny ways.

Safe Deposit Boxes?

[mveloso]

Shouldn't the EFF argue that a cloud service is the equivalent of a bank's safe deposit box? Someone else holds your property on your behalf. For SDBs, the government needs a warrant...just like if your stuff was in the cloud.

Re:Bullshit.

[oh_my_080980980]

Actually you do for cloud services. Read the contracts that Google has....so the government can argue you don't have any expectation of property rights if you waive them with the cloud carrier. Then again, you could argue, the contract is between you and google and not the government. Therefore the government cannot assume it gets the same rights, as set force in the contract, as the cloud carrier.

Oooo the arguments....

Re:So....

[Shoten]

Totally irrelevant. But just the same, also factually wrong, so I'll reply:

Actually, no he didn't...not even close. You can go back a couple of decades to the Black Chamber, or even further back by centuries to Sir Walsingham. You could argue that Sun Tzu was a forerunner, but if I had to pick a single person to actually start the surveillance of citizens by government, I'd choose Walsingham. And you know what? He stopped a number of plots against Queen Elizabeth I that way, and it's really hard to argue that his methods were unnecessary or heavy-handed.