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TECHNOLOGY Monday 3 July 2017

Microsoft, Trump administration clash over email searches

By MARK SHERMAN in New York agreed with among those watching Even Judge Gerard Lynch Microsoft also supports re-
Associated Press the company that the 1986 the case closely. on the New York panel that vising the law. The com-
WASHINGTON (AP) — On Stored Communications “This is a big deal in an era sided with Microsoft called pany also is among those
the surface, the investiga- Act does not apply outside of a global internet. Serv- for “congressional action challenging “gag orders”
tion was routine. the United States. ers are not just in the Unit- to revise a badly outdated that prevent service pro-
Federal agents persuaded The administration’s Su- ed States. They’re all over statute.” The Stored Com- viders from notifying cus-
a judge to issue a warrant
for a Microsoft email ac-
count they suspected was
used for drug trafficking.
But U.S.-based Microsoft
kept the emails on a server
in Ireland. Microsoft said
that meant the emails
were beyond the warrant’s
reach. A federal appeals
court agreed.
Late last month, the Trump
administration asked the
Supreme Court to inter-
vene.
The case is among several
legal clashes that Red-
mond, Washington-based
Microsoft and other tech-
nology companies have
had with the government
over questions of digital pri-
vacy and authorities’ need
for information to combat
crime and extremism. Pri-
vacy law experts say the
companies have been
more willing to push back This July 3, 2014, file photo, shows the Microsoft Corp. logo outside the Microsoft Visitor Center in Redmond, Wash.
against the government Associated Press
since the leak of classi-
fied information detailing preme Court appeal said the world, and figuring out munications Act became tomers that their data
America’s surveillance the decision is damaging the rules for foreign-stored law long before the ad- have been turned over
programs. Another issue “hundreds if not thousands data is really important, vent of cloud computing. to the government under
highlighted in the appeal of investigations of crimes not just for us, but for for- To the extent personal in- court order.
is the difficulty that judges — ranging from terrorism, eign governments,” said formation was kept online, Companies have been
face in trying to square de- to child pornography, to Orin Kerr, a George Wash- it was mainly on personal more willing to assert their
cades-old laws with new fraud.” The emails, the ad- ington University law pro- computers. customers’ and their own
technological develop- ministration noted, may fessor whose work is cited Today, companies build privacy interests since
ments. reside on a server some- in the appellate ruling. data centers around the former National Security
In the latest case, a sus- where, but said Microsoft One problem identified world to keep up with their Agency contractor Ed-
pected drug trafficker can retrieve them “domes- by Kerr and other privacy customers’ demands for ward Snowden’s leak of
used Microsoft’s email ser- tically with the click of a scholars is that courts might speed and access. classified U.S. material
vice. In 2013, federal inves- computer mouse.” not be the best place to Members of Congress have about America’s surveil-
tigators obtained a war- Microsoft’s president, Brad resolve these issues. introduced legislation to lance programs, Kerr said.
rant under a 1986 law for Smith, said in a blog post Should the same rules ap- update the law, but noth- The technology compa-
the emails themselves as following the high court ply to the emails of an ing has been enacted. nies wield enormous pow-
well as identifying informa- appeal that the adminis- American citizen and a Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, er, perhaps more than gov-
tion about the user of the tration’s position “would foreigner? Does it matter opposes the administra- ernments do, in shaping
email account. put businesses in impos- where the person is living? tion’s appeal, but said in a the scope of digital age
Microsoft turned over the sible conflict-of-law situa- “The Supreme Court can’t statement that “Congress privacy rights, Daskal said.
information, but went to tions and hurt the security, answer these questions in can and should modernize The companies decide
court to defend its deci- jobs, and personal rights of the nuanced way that’s data privacy laws to en- “what to retain, where to
sion not to hand over the Americans.” needed,” said Jennifer sure that law enforcement keep it, for how long, and
emails from Ireland. Technology companies Daskal, an American Uni- can access evidence in a whether to encrypt it,” she
The federal appeals court and privacy experts are versity law professor. timely manner.” said. q