Google, Unlike Microsoft, Must Turn Over Foreign Emails, Rules Judge (fortune.com)

Every year Google receives more than 25,000 requests from U.S. authorities for "disclosures of user data in criminal matters," according to a U.S. judge's recent ruling. But this one is different. An anonymous reader quotes Reuters: A U.S. judge has ordered Google to comply with search warrants seeking customer emails stored outside the U.S., diverging from a federal appeals court that reached the opposite conclusion in a similar case involving Microsoft. U.S. Magistrate Judge Thomas Rueter in Philadelphia ruled on Friday that transferring emails from a foreign server so FBI agents could review them locally as part of a domestic fraud probe did not qualify as a seizure...because there was "no meaningful interference" with the account holder's "possessory interest" in the data sought.

"Though the retrieval of the electronic data by Google from its multiple data centers abroad has the potential for an invasion of privacy, the actual infringement of privacy occurs at the time of disclosure in the United States," Rueter wrote... The ruling came less than seven months after the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New York said Microsoft could not be forced to turn over emails stored on a server in Dublin, Ireland that U.S. investigators sought in a narcotics case.
Google announced they'd appeal the case, saying "We will continue to push back on overbroad warrants."

Comments

I can't think of a good subject

[Anonymous Coward]

"no meaningful interference with the account holder's possessory interest" WTF?

I'll just leave this here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GyV_UG60dD4

Re:I can't think of a good subject

[drinkypoo]

I believe a federal judge just ruled that "copying isn't theft, since the owner still has his copy". I know I've heard that argument before somewhere. Interesting precedent.

Only a minority of joe schmoes believe that copyright infringement is theft. Everyone else, including federal prosecutors, know that it is not. That's why we have laws addressing copyright infringement; if it were theft, you wouldn't need any new laws to prosecute offenders, because we already have laws addressing theft.

Maybe this judge didn't think things through.

[Sique]

I wonder what happens if an E.U. court finds that the data transfer of personal data from an E.U. located server to the U.S. without E.U. judicary oversight is illegal. That was one of the arguments in the Microsoft case. If the U.S. judge then orders Google to ignore the E.U. court, he could be held in contempt of the E.U. court and face punitive measures.

Re:Maybe this judge didn't think things through.

[Solandri]

That was the point of the Microsoft ruling. Rulings like in this Google case can put companies (and by precedent, people) in an impossible position where in order to comply with one country's laws, they're forced to break another country's laws. Kinda like the U.S. policy that U.S. citizens have to pay U.S. taxes on income earned abroad could hypothetically cause a U.S. citizen to owe more than 100% in taxes (if the combined tax rates of the U.S. and other country exceeded 100%).

Other countries avoid the problem by accepting that their laws end at their borders, and if they want something from another country they have to work with that country for joint law enforcement action or extradition. But for some reason politicians and judges in the U.S. keep thinking U.S. law should apply all around the world.

Re:Maybe this judge didn't think things through.

[Macdude]

Kinda like the U.S. policy that U.S. citizens have to pay U.S. taxes on income earned abroad could hypothetically cause a U.S. citizen to owe more than 100% in taxes

No it can't. You claim a Foreign Tax Credit for any income tax paid to a foreign government and it's deducted from your tax payable in the US. For example if your US tax rate was 35% and your foreign tax rate was 30%, you would pay 30% to the foreign government and then 5% (35% - 30%) to the US government.

See: IRS Publication 514 https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pd...

Re:Maybe this judge didn't think things through.

[Godwin O'Hitler]

Do you get 5% back if its 40% abroad?

**AA should be concerned

[beuges]

If retrieving a copy of an email while leaving the original intact creates "no meaningful interference" with the account holder's "possessory interest" of that email, how long before this ruling is used as a defence against the RIAA and MPAA's copyright infringement efforts?

Since making a copy of a movie does not create a meaningful interference with the account holder's possessory interest of the movie, surely it can't be worth all those lawsuits?

Re:Constutution

[thsths]

And this is one of the reasons we are moving to Microsoft for our email and file storage. I have no idea why the 4th amendment only applies to Microsoft, not to Google, but so be it.

Of course according to Trump, aliens are not people. I wonder whether he can find a corrupt judge to support that argument.

Re:Constutution

[hawguy]

And this is one of the reasons we are moving to Microsoft for our email and file storage. I have no idea why the 4th amendment only applies to Microsoft, not to Google, but so be it.

If you're worried about the government reading your emails, why risk using a USA company at all? Use a company that has no USA presence at all. Or better, roll your own offshore and control your own encryption keys.

Of course according to Trump, aliens are not people. I wonder whether he can find a corrupt judge to support that argument.

He's right there... aliens aren't always people, sometimes they are lizards, sometimes they are amorphous blobs

Re:Constutution

[currently_awake]

I would suggest Microsoft Corporation has a "Working Business Relationship" with the US Government, that grants them more leeway in such matters.