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US Supreme Court To Decide Microsoft Email Privacy Dispute (reuters.com)

Posted by msmash on from the next-up dept.

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday agreed to resolve a major privacy dispute between the Justice Department and Microsoft Corp over whether prosecutors should get access to emails stored on company servers overseas. From a report: The justices will hear the Trump administration's appeal of a lower court's ruling last year preventing federal prosecutors from obtaining emails stored in Microsoft computer servers in Dublin, Ireland in a drug trafficking investigation. That decision by the New York-based 2nd U.S. Court of Appeals marked a victory for privacy advocates and technology companies that increasingly offer cloud computing services in which data is stored remotely. Microsoft, which has 100 data centers in 40 countries, was the first U.S. company to challenge a domestic search warrant seeking data held outside the country. There have been several similar challenges, most brought by Google.

39 of 70 comments (clear)

  1. America owns the world by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Therefore there is no jurisdiction issue.

    1. Re:America owns the world by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

      This has nothing to do with "owning the world". If a Microsoft employee, located in the U.S., can access a server located in [some other country], then the location of that server is irrelevant. That is the argument being used by the U.S. government, and in this case they are correct.

      To argue otherwise means:

      You're claiming that a person located in the U.S. is governed by EU law, e.g., they can't access a server they own and control except in accordance with EU law, despite the fact that they are not in the EU. You are, in fact, trying to impose EU law on a person sitting at a computer in the U.S.

      Any person/business located in the U.S. just has to put all their servers outside the U.S. and access them remotely and they become immune to all U.S. laws. Want to investigate Microsoft/Google/Whoever for securities fraud or some other wrong doing? Sorry, all their documents and e-mails are located on a server outside the U.S. and they don't have to give them to you.

    2. Re:America owns the world by Errol+backfiring · · Score: 1

      Well, that's the beauty of a world-wide network. A person can be sitting in front of a terminal in the U.S. and do business from, say, Europe because he has put a web server there that does all his transactions. I am really curious as to what would happen if he put his web server in orbit, outside any country. Or on an asteroid.

      In fact, pilots of armed drones can kill someone in another country. The law can only make sense if the owner/controller has to comply with laws of both the residential country AND the country the action took place. When selling something on the internet, that would also include the laws of the person at the other end of the transaction.

      Hey, nobody said it would be easy.

      --
      Nae king! Nae laird! Nae yurrupiean pressedent! We willna be fooled again!
    3. Re:America owns the world by Okind · · Score: 2

      You're claiming that a person located in the U.S. is governed by EU law, e.g., they can't access a server they own and control except in accordance with EU law, despite the fact that they are not in the EU. You are, in fact, trying to impose EU law on a person sitting at a computer in the U.S.

      Actually, where the person is located does not matter much.

      We see this in the US with sales tax on online sales. While you could argue that the sale takes place in the retailers server, according to the law it takes place in the customers home. This is why retailers (assuming sufficient presence, i.e. nexus) must pay sales tax where thew customer lives. The same applies in the EU by the way, for purposes of consumer protection, VAT, etc. Where the company (and its employees) are located does not matter.

      Another issue here is the EU-US Privacy Shield: whatever the US supreme court decides must be in line with the agreement with the EU, or we'll face new problems as we did when the previous safe harbor provisions were struck down.

      Given that the email belongs to people in the EU, both the provisions of the EU-US Privacy Shield and the EU privacy protection laws apply. AFAIK, this means that the decision to hand over the data must be decided by a EU judge.

    4. Re:America owns the world by Sique · · Score: 4, Informative
      No. The claim is that just because a person is technically able to do something it does not mean that the person is legally able to do it. Most people are technically able to kill someone, but not many are legally entitled to do so.

      Yes, a person in the U.S. can copy personal data from a computer located in the E.U. to a computer located in the U.S.. But doing so without the consent of the person the data belongs to is illegal in the E.U.. The European High Court has decided that even U.S. legal enforcement is not allowed to do so without serving a warrant to the responsible european court first. If a court in the U.S. decides otherwise it would be in contempt of the EHC. I wonder what happens if the EHC then serves a warrant against an U.S. court for doing so.

      --
      .sig: Sique *sigh*
    5. Re:America owns the world by nospam007 · · Score: 2

      "You're claiming that a person located in the U.S. is governed by EU law, e.g., they can't access a server they own and control except in accordance with EU law, despite the fact that they are not in the EU. You are, in fact, trying to impose EU law on a person sitting at a computer in the U.S."

      You mean like when you get delivered the guy who hacked a US computer from England, because he violated US law from his mother's British cellar?

    6. Re:America owns the world by Sique · · Score: 1

      And what should happen in your opinion if the warrant is granted in the U.S., but an E.U. court knowing about the announced breach of European law serves another warrant that forces Microsoft's european technicians to disconnect all servers storing the data in questions from the network? How does the U.S. court then enforce its warrant?

      --
      .sig: Sique *sigh*
    7. Re:America owns the world by jedidiah · · Score: 2

      Then the US company should be held in contempt and charged with obstruction of justice and destruction of evidence. The question here is whether or not you can hide evidence from courts. The fact that it's being done with computers is really quite irrelevant.

      This is not a "tech" article at all.

      A corporation wants to pretend it's above the law by engaging in a shell game with their documents.

      --
      A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
    8. Re:America owns the world by Frobnicator · · Score: 2

      That is exactly the situation that makes it so interesting from a legal view.

      The US courts can order the US company to take the action. But the instant they start messing with the data in Ireland, the emails of a the citizen who lives in Ireland, then the international treaties between the US and Ireland come into play.

      If that happens -- meaning the US Supreme Court orders or allows the government to violate the international treaty even though proper channels exist through the treaty -- the consequences get complicated very quickly. Nations routinely violate treaties and the US does it all the time, particularly around military actions. Exactly how the nations respond varies by nation.

      Ireland may quietly do nothing and allow the treaty violation. Diplomatic channels have been active since this started, and whatever action is taken will have closed-door diplomatic consequences. More publicly, Ireland's politicians may raise the issue with the international courts or with the UN. They may instead chose a more passive-aggressive stance either with or without public declarations, requiring more strict scrutiny to law enforcement requests and requiring extra time as they triple-check every detail of the request against all applicable law. Since international law enforcement requests must be vetted by all nations involved, Ireland could respond extremely slowly or find reasons to disallow the bulk of future requests, perhaps only allowing the most extreme cases (like child sexual abuse) to pass through in a timely manner.

      Other nations may also respond in varying degrees. Like above this may range from no visible response, closed-door diplomatic responses, to increasing difficulty working with the nation, to public statements of disapproval, to full-blown official actions in international policy organizations.

      Nations that are firmly against the US could rightly publicise it as yet another instance of the US willfully ignoring their treaty obligations. With Trump routinely going to the media to declare he will disregard treaties this is not a surprising thing. Even before Trump, as a nation the country lost its moral high ground on treaties decades ago; the US is a nation that generally follows the rule of law, but has demonstrated no qualms about violating the rule of law when those in power think they can get away with it. Although this one is relatively small, yet another treaty violation can be added to the stack and the rallying cries about the duplicitous actions of the country, and how the US does whatever it wants without regard to treaties and promises it has made.

      If it goes forward, probably the US government will get the data they have been fishing for, they'll win that specific battle, but it will come at a cost for future international cooperation. There will be an enormous cost to all the other international police investigations that use the treaty. While they get the data in one specific case, untold thousands of other cases that are legitimate and using the proper channels will face the negative repercussions, in addition to whatever political fallout comes with it.

      --
      //TODO: Think of witty sig statement
    9. Re:America owns the world by Sique · · Score: 1
      And if the technicians don't disconnect the servers, they are charged with obstruction of justice in Europe.

      And if police forces come into the data center in Ireland and then serve the warrant to disconnect the servers, can the technicians (and thus Microsoft) claim duress? They can even obtain a paper from the european police men that they tried to fulfill the court order but were hindered by the european police forces. How does the U.S. court enforce its warrant now?

      --
      .sig: Sique *sigh*
    10. Re:America owns the world by Frobnicator · · Score: 1

      A corporation wants to pretend it's above the law by engaging in a shell game with their documents.

      Are you following the same story? This is not the shell game you propose.

      The US government refuses to include details like if the person is an American, but instead they have bound the details of the case in secrecy. Microsoft is a global company with smaller corporations in each nation to follow the local laws. The US government in a local criminal investigation (for something not criminal in much of the world) has issued a search warrant for one company to seize information held by a sister-company in another nation, for hardware held in another nation, against someone who is probably a citizen of another nation, for crimes that are probably not illegal in that other nation.

      For those who have followed the case for the past several years, it is clear the US government is looking for a way to sidestep existing international law and international treaties. Instead of following standard protocol for international warrants, and using the international crime-fighting treaties to get an Irish warrant against Microsoft of Ireland to seize data stored on servers in Ireland about a person who is probably an Irish citizen or perhaps a citizen of the EU, the government has doubled-down on the bad bet. For the past four years they could have cancelled the warrant and gone through the regular international channels to get a warrant for international communications.

      It is nonsensical. As some parallels, consider how Microsoft has offices in Dubai. Imagine the response if the Dubai government demanded of Microsoft's Dubai office that Microsoft USA turned over all emails from Microsoft's American servers about Americans because they might be related to an investigation of Dubai's laws forbidding sexual relations, even flirting, outside of marriage. So to investigate a Dubai woman who might have had indirect contact with someone in America, in order to find evidence to punish her, instead of going through regular international courts they produce a search warrant in Dubai that requires Dubai police to seize servers in the US. Then they fight for four years in an attempt to get that search warrant executed.

      Or another parallel, consider how Microsoft has offices in China. Imagine if the Chinese government demanded Microsoft's Chinese office that Microsoft USA turned over all emails from Microsoft's American servers about Americans because they might be related to an investigation about Chinese laws prohibiting ill-speaking of government workers. To investigate someone in China who might have had indirect contact with someone in America, so they can find evidence that perhaps the Chinese person really did write something subversive to the government, instead of using the international legal tools, they produce a warrant that requires Chinese investigators to seize servers in the US. Then they fight for four years in an attempt to get that search warrant executed.

      There are simple existing tools for this. They can submit a request for Irish law enforcement to execute the search warrant against Microsoft of Ireland so they can search the servers held in Ireland. That type of international search warrant happens all the time. They are choosing to ignore it not because Microsoft in America is playing a shell game, but because the police are looking for ways around the safeguards that have been established to protect people from abuses of other nations.

      --
      //TODO: Think of witty sig statement
    11. Re:America owns the world by n329619 · · Score: 2

      This has nothing to do with "owning the world". If a Microsoft employee, located in the U.S., can access a server located in [some other country], then the location of that server is irrelevant. That is the argument being used by the U.S. government, and in this case they are

      incorrect. That is because the Microsoft employee can access a server located in [some other country] due to permission from someone ([some other country] MS employees) at the location to enable access to the server. The [some other country] MS employee have 100% rights to physically disconnect their server at anytime under their judgement and the local country's jurisdiction.

      Simpler concept: Guy 1 has a ball and Guy 2 also has a ball. Separated by land while under agreement and regulation, both of them can throw the ball to each other. Then separate land Police 1 and Police 2 came. Police 1 can ask Guy 1 to give him his ball. Police 2 can ask Guy 2 to give him his ball. But Police 1 cannot ask Guy 2 for his ball without asking Police 2 first, where Guy 1 is irrelevant. The problem is now Police 1 is asking Guy 1 for Guy 2's ball without asking Police 2.

      We are not "claiming that a person located in the U.S. is governed by EU law", but the person located in the EU is governed by the EU law., and outsider can't tell him/her to bypass their law.

    12. Re:America owns the world by Okind · · Score: 1

      Same store, same transaction, different result. The law is, as Dickens wrote, an ass.

      Although I won't dispute your comment about the law (I frequently agree), the fact that it's the same store does not mean that the transaction is the same: part of the transaction is a location. Obviously, any location related to the transaction could have been chosen as transaction location:

      • where the store is
      • where the sales clerk / server is
      • where the customer is at the time of transaction

      For a physical transaction in a brick&mortar store, these are all (approximately) the same, so we don't notice if the law uses a different one than we / most people do. But when the transaction is handled online, the differences become apparent and thus what we interpret to be the same transaction (after all: same store, same item, same price, so same transaction, right?) suddenly is not.

      This is where the law suddenly becomes illogical, cumbersome and/or subject to greedy politicians. It is also the point where laws start to create new conflicts. US law and EU law may both be internally coherent (I'm not claiming they are), but their combination most likely is not. Hence the current dispute over accessing emails on a server in the EU by people in the US. And as a bonus for this quagmire: whose judge gets to decide on the issue? This is most certainly not just an issue of law, but also an issue of government power.

    13. Re:America owns the world by Godwin+O'Hitler · · Score: 1

      Ireland may quietly do nothing and allow the treaty violation.

      And the data's owner could then take the matter directly to the European Court of Justice. Possibly event preempt the violation by an ECJ injunction (not sure if such a thing exists).
      This does not of course stop the US prosecuting the person involved for failing to turn the data over voluntarily. That has nothing whatsoever to do with server location.

      --
      No, your children are not the special ones. Nor are your pets.
    14. Re:America owns the world by Okind · · Score: 1

      We see this in the US with sales tax on online sales. While you could argue that the sale takes place in the retailers server, according to the law it takes place in the customers home. This is why retailers (assuming sufficient presence, i.e. nexus) must pay sales tax where thew customer lives. The same applies in the EU by the way, for purposes of consumer protection, VAT, etc. Where the company (and its employees) are located does not matter.

      FALSE: Customers pay sales tax, retailers collect sales tax on behalf of the government, but the tax liability is the purchasers, not the sellers (see use tax). The argument becomes whether a government can require a citizen of a different state to operate on it's behalf by requiring them to collect this tax. (answer: they cannot -this is why establishing nexus becomes relevant.)

      While you are correct that retailers do not pay sales tax, this does not invalidate my argument: the sales tax must be paid where the transaction takes place. This is where the customer is. Who must pay the tax (in this case the customer) is irrelevant.

    15. Re:America owns the world by Sique · · Score: 1

      And so does the European court. Imagine the following: The European High Court serves a warrant to the U.S. Supreme Court for contempt, and put out a search warrant for the justices. They should never travel abroad then.

      --
      .sig: Sique *sigh*
  2. Who owns the server? by Opportunist · · Score: 1

    MS in the US or MS in Ireland?

    If you say "doesn't matter", realize that SAP is based in Germany, and we'd want to see some data you have over there. Schnell!

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
    1. Re:Who owns the server? by ytene · · Score: 3, Insightful

      It will almost certainly be owned by Microsoft Ireland, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Microsoft Inc, US.

      Unfortunately, this is where the story gets interesting. Whilst MS Inc, the US Parent, is incorporated under US Law and therefore subject to US jurisdiction, if the Irish subsidiary is incorporated under Irish law, then the ability of the US government to exert demands on it are potentially eliminated.

      I have found that a good test to apply in a situation like this is to reverse the scenario. Here's a hypothetical situation to put this to the test: imagine that "Microsoft Ireland" was found guilty of a criminal offence [it doesn't matter what] and that the fine levied for this was equal to $100 Billion US. Now imagine that Microsoft Ireland are worth a grand total of say $40 Billion US and that extracting even this from them will completely bankrupt them.

      Would the Supreme Court / Microsoft (US) inc be willing to allow the reciprocal to happen - i.e. that the plaintiff in the Irish case has the authority to go after Microsoft US for the remaining $60 Billion of their settlement? In other words - does that liability go both ways?

      Obviously this is an academic question for a hypothetical situation; my sense is that the US parent would not want an open-door liability like this to be allowed. Which, whilst different in some respects, rather serves to enforce the view that these are two entirely different legal entities, incorporated under the laws of entirely different countries. If Microsoft Ireland had been incorporated under US law, then there might be an argument supporting the view of the US government. If it exists under Irish law, I don't see how the US government's case can have merit.

      But then again, I'm not a lawyer...

    2. Re:Who owns the server? by Brett+Buck · · Score: 1

      It doesn't matter. MS (the people in the USA) can certainly be compelled to provide the information or, more likely, be sanctioned. If they made a deal with a foreign company (MS Ireland, presumably) that precludes them from doing so, then, there might be a price to pay for that. MS doesn't have to be permitted to do business in the USA if they start ignoring court orders, for instance.

        SAP, same story, if SAP themselves own data in Germany, the USA can try all they want to get it, but they only get it if a German or possibly EU court demands it.

        Of course, you can probably assume that there are other means to obtain the information for national security purposes but that's not going to matter or be available for purposes of the court.

    3. Re:Who owns the server? by Anubis+IV · · Score: 3, Insightful

      It doesn't matter who owns the server, since even if it is MS Ireland, they're almost certainly a wholly owned subsidiary of MS US, meaning that MS US owns that data regardless. And if the US government compels MS US to hand the data over, they'll be making a request that's illegal in the country where the action must be undertaken, regardless of whether it's MS US or MS Ireland doing the deed, so in that regard it also doesn't matter who owns the server.

      Of course, just because it doesn't matter who owns the server doesn't mean it's legal for the US government to make that request, nor that it's legal for MS (regardless of which brand we're talking about) to hand the data over.

      Ideally, the people on the ground in Ireland would simply refuse to comply with the order if MS was compelled to hand over the data. After all, the US government has no authority over them, nor an ability to prosecute them, nor an ability to pursue a prosecution of them via diplomatic channels given that the request was illegal in the first place. In fact, the proper way for this to work is that the US government uses those diplomatic channels to seek an extraction of the data pursuant to its treaties with Ireland or the EU.

      Unfortunately, it may be possible for MS US to extract the data from Ireland without the involvement of the people in Ireland. If that's the case, then those Americans may be opening themselves up to contempt or court and other charges for failing to produce documents that they are capable of producing. When Apple was facing a similar situation with the FBI attempting to compel them to add a backdoor to iOS, the rumors leaking from internally indicated that the team that would have been compelled to take those actions planned to quit if push came to shove, and that other companies were already lined up to accept them if need be. I'd expect that the same would be true here: anyone who quit over an issue like this would have no trouble finding work elsewhere in the industry.

    4. Re:Who owns the server? by Alain+Williams · · Score: 1

      Even simpler case: an Irish company is ordered by an Irish court to obtain data from its subsidiary in the USA. Which court wins ?

    5. Re: Who owns the server? by Brett+Buck · · Score: 1

      I am not assuming that at all. All I am assuming that if MS doesn't come up with it for whatever reason, they are liable for sanctions. "Gee, we asked them and they said no" isn't going to get them out of it.

            It would be a real stretch but depending on the rest of the case (and of course I didn't RTFA...) MS could be liable for obstruction of justice for squirreling the data/evidence away from US jurisdiction. They may never make the original case for lack of the evidence but nothing keeps them from going after MS for having blocked their access. Taking a bit of evidence that everyone agrees exists, and hiding it or removing it from access, is definitely something you can get in trouble for. It would be a tough case to win but it would seem impossible to dismiss summarily.

    6. Re:Who owns the server? by Alain+Williams · · Score: 1

      It doesn't matter who owns the server, since even if it is MS Ireland, they're almost certainly a wholly owned subsidiary of MS US, meaning that MS US owns that data regardless.

      The EU might not agree that that is the case.

      Can anyone tell me where I can buy popcorn in bulk ?

    7. Re:Who owns the server? by HiThere · · Score: 1

      Given the US data protection laws, there's no conflict of law.

      --

      I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
    8. Re:Who owns the server? by Anubis+IV · · Score: 1

      Yeah, that was a typo. I realized I was using "data" interchangeably with "server" when I shouldn't have been. I went back and replaced most of them, but missed that one, apparently. I didn't want to get anywhere near the topic of who owns the data, since that wasn't the point of my post and wasn't at all something I was trying to address.

    9. Re:Who owns the server? by HiThere · · Score: 1

      IIUC, the laws of Ireland prohibit exporting personal information to the US because of US laws on data protection. So for someone in Ireland to ship the data to the US would be in violation of Irish law.

      This isn't just corporate maneuvering, it's also governments arguing about jurisdiction. The US is demanding that Irish laws be violated on Irish soil. And Irish law derives from EU law, so this is also the US vs. the EU.

      --

      I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
    10. Re:Who owns the server? by lionchild · · Score: 1

      I suspect that this will be a split decision, but I would surmise that the SCOTUS will not be willing to set the precident that it's okay for another country to access data across boarders with traditional search warrants, but this will require cooperative search warrants. That is, if the US issues a Search Warrant, and then the country in which the server resides will, in turn, issue a matching Search Warrant, then the data can be accessed.

      However, I do not believe the SCOTUS will want Ireland or Dubia or any other of these 40+ countries to be able to unilaterally issue a single Search Warrant for data inside the US. If SCOTUS allows the US to do it, they set the precident that they would agree that other countries could do it to the US.

      Just my gut feeling on the matter.

      --
      Awk! Pieces of eight. Pieces of eight. Pieces of seven... ERROR: General Protection Fault. [Paroty Error.]
    11. Re:Who owns the server? by Kjella · · Score: 3, Insightful

      You talk a lot about legal and illegal without mentioning jurisdiction which is rather important since the US got jurisdiction over MS US, Ireland over MS Ireland. The US can legally put the thumbscrews on MS US to produce the documents, Ireland can legally put the thumbscrews on MS Ireland to not produce the documents. Which puts Microsoft in a "damned if you do and damned if you don't" position, but there's no "world court" they can appeal to. The US can say we're right, appeal denied and Ireland can say the same. It still won't be possible for Microsoft to comply with both.

      It's clear to see why the US - or indeed any country - don't like the idea that you can "jurisdiction shopping", like oh all our company data is outsourced to our wholly owned subsidiary in the Cayman Islands and we wouldn't want to break any local laws, you'll have to go through the courts there. But if that's a problem you should restrict the export of information, like if you're a US company the data on US citizens must be accessible to US courts. Trying to demand that all data held by foreign subsidiaries, even on foreign citizens be available to US courts is begging for trouble.

      The reciprocity here is that a Chinese court can demand data on US citizens stored on US servers by a US subsidiary because it's owned by a Chinese company. The US would never grant the permissions it's trying to create for itself, it's one rule for us and one rule for everybody else. Hopefully the supreme court is smart enough to see that, otherwise there is only one choice: Stop making any product made by a US company in any privacy-sensitive context.

      --
      Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
    12. Re:Who owns the server? by Anubis+IV · · Score: 1

      Great points all around, I'm glad someone made them. You're right that I glossed right over those distinctions, though I'll say that I did so intentionally since I wanted to focus on other aspects of the situation.

      Thanks for the insightful comment!

  3. If MS is compelled, by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    Does that mean that my country's government can compel MS to hand over data stored on servers in the US?

    1. Re:If MS is compelled, by jedidiah · · Score: 2

      If it's the data of one of your country's citizens or corporations, then why not? Even our right to privacy is not a universal shield against a warrant or subpeona.

      --
      A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
    2. Re:If MS is compelled, by ilsaloving · · Score: 1

      Of course not. Standard US foreign policy has always been, "What's good for the goose ISN'T good for gander."

    3. Re:If MS is compelled, by tomhath · · Score: 1

      Even a "secret" Swiss bank account can be subpoenaed in a criminal trial.

  4. In Microsoft's own words by Khopesh · · Score: 3, Insightful
    This is also mentioned on Microsoft's own post on US Supreme Court will hear petition to review Microsoft search warrant case while momentum to modernize the law continues in Congress, in which MS states:

    We will continue to press our case in court that the Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) – a law enacted decades before there was such a thing as cloud computing – was never intended to reach within other countries’ borders.

    ... We challenged the warrant that resulted in this ligation because we believed U.S. search warrants shouldn’t reach over borders to seize the emails of people who live outside the United States and whose emails are stored outside the United States.

    This is really important not only for international privacy but also for US business profits from international sources (which is a major reason for Microsoft being on the right side of the issue).

    --
    Use my userscript to add story images to Slashdot. There's no going back.
  5. Sauce for the gander by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    OP's snark was directed at the US Government's long history of prosecuting people under claims that persons located in the EU are governed by US law (anti bribery US laws are but one example).

    Such prosecutions become even higher profile when those EU located persons are accessing computers located in the US. The exact obverse of this case.

    In other words ... what's sauce for the goose is also sauce for the gander.

  6. Re:Microsoft posts by HiThere · · Score: 1

    Give me a reason to believe that's what they're doing. They're protecting corporate secrets from an intrusive government.

    OTOH, the US government seems to be demanding that Irish (EU) laws be violated on Irish soil in order to satisfy their demands. Which seems a definite overreach.

    --

    I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
  7. Re:Request Is Improper by tomhath · · Score: 1

    The issue has nothing to do with Ireland. It's data on a US citizen that Microsoft (a US company) has.

  8. Re: Request Is Improper by tomhath · · Score: 1

    Nobody is asking Microsoft to go to Ireland in order to retrieve the data; it can be accessed from the US.

  9. Search warrant != Subpoena by Lost+Race · · Score: 1

    A search warrant does not compel anyone to provide anything. A search warrant just means that the holder of the warrant is allowed to search, and the results of the search will be admissible as evidence. When the police say, "We're going to search your property," whether they have a warrant or not, all you have to do is step aside and not interfere.

    Now, if they have a subpoena, then you may be compelled to produce some evidence, by whatever means are at your disposal.

    So if the US police show Microsoft a warrant to search some data center in Ireland, all Microsoft has to do is step aside and let them search that datacenter in Ireland. (Good luck with that, US police.) If they want Microsoft to log into that data center remotely and retrieve the data for them, they'll need a subpoena to that effect. In the case at hand, the police got lazy and the court smacked them down.