Comment by throwaway7767 | Hacker News Reader

Comment by throwaway7767 | Hacker News Reader

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Microsoft has shown that they are quite willing to access induviduals private data if they have a financial stake in it [0]. Yes, they eventually backtracked under public pressure (after trying very hard to justify how it's totally okay because they were going to pay a lawyer to rubber-stamp things in the future), but it's rather hard to listen to their general council talking about how they value privacy on principle given their history. It's quite obvious they only care about privacy insofar as it affects their bottom line.

The article also conflates (intentionally?) this issue with the mass-surveillance issue, bringing Snowden into it and insinuating that this ruling would have an effect on that, which is just silly [1].

The whole "Company F" section is interesting (hadn't heard before that microsoft is challenging the statement that they were willingly providing user data to the NSA), but it's a bit hard to square with the leaked documents which list microsoft as the first participating partner in the PRISM program [2]

[0] http://www.geekwire.com/2014/microsoft-defends-hotmail-snoop... [1] http://www.cbsnews.com/news/patriot-act-can-obtain-data-in-e... [2] http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2013/09/nsa-timeline-sur...

Their statement says

In this case, there was a thorough review by a legal team separate from the investigating team and strong evidence of a criminal act that met a standard comparable to that required to obtain a legal order to search other sites.

I don't think that supports your claim that they would only ask a lawyer in the future.

> Their statement says

> In this case, there was a thorough review by a legal team separate from the investigating team and strong evidence of a criminal act that met a standard comparable to that required to obtain a legal order to search other sites.

>I don't think that supports your claim that they would only ask a lawyer in the future.

From the link I included in my comment, Microsoft deputy general counsel John Frank is quoted: "As a new and additional step, we will then submit this evidence to an outside attorney who is a former federal judge. We will conduct such a search only if this former judge similarly concludes that there is evidence sufficient for a court order."

This lawyer (his past employment as a judge has no bearing here) would have been paid by Microsoft.

Could you explain how that does not fit with my earlier comment?

And to preempt the inevitable, yes, as I said in the original comment they eventually backtracked on this and said they'd report such future crimes to the police. You know, what they should have done in the beginning, and would have done if they had the respect for privacy-on-principle that they are now trying to shower themselves in.

"they were going to pay a lawyer to rubber-stamp things in the future" carries the implication that they hadn't asked a lawyer this time. Asking a "legal team" is asking a lawyer.

They decided to ask even more lawyers, at least one who is outside and a former judge, they didn't decide to ask one lawyer as opposed to zero before.

I'm also not so sure you can draw broad conclusions about the company from this particular policy; "we will only search an email for someone else after a court order, and we may search ourselves if we believe there's enough evidence for a court order (we being lawyers)." I don't see much difference between the old and new policies; the main thing is that someone outside is asked.

Congratulations, you win the nit-picking contest. My point was that the advice of a lawyer changes nothing. Violating users privacy should be reserved for law enforcement with court orders.

How should Microsoft go about asking a court to search their own servers?

Also, you implied you were fine with the new policy and that it was a significant change; claiming your point was the opposite at this point means you were very unclear. How should I have figured out what you meant from your words above?

> How should Microsoft go about asking a court to search their own servers?

The people pressing charges do not apply for court orders. The police does so in cases where they believe it is needed for an active investigation. Microsoft should then have a policy of not disclosing information to law enforcement unless provided with a court order.

The fact that microsoft ended up stating that they would do exactly this in the future should indicate that this is not the problem you are making it out to be.

> Also, you implied you were fine with the new policy and that it was a significant change; claiming your point was the opposite at this point means you were very unclear. How should I have figured out what you meant from your words above?

By reading the post with a mind to reading the likely meaning, rather than focusing on finding unlikely meanings. As if you were a human communicating with another human, rather than a tokenizer reading source code. If you did that, you would see that my point has been consistent the entire time.

If you read the totality of the post, the point is quite clear, and I've restated it a few times now.

I assume this is clear now? Because if not, I'm starting to suspect a troll and am not interested in furthering this conversation.

>Microsoft should then have a policy of not disclosing information to law enforcement unless provided with a court order.

According to the statement, that was their policy.

>The fact that microsoft ended up stating that they would do exactly this in the future should indicate that this is not the problem you are making it out to be.

The steps they said they were adding in the statement don't include going to the police. I'm not sure what you mean by this statement that could be correct.

I went over your comments again, and they contradict each other, let alone the facts.

as I said in the original comment they eventually backtracked on this and said they'd report such future crimes to the police.

Whereas your original comment doesn't mention the police at all.

I get that you feel you've been consistent, but you haven't communicated your actual thoughts very well. The other possibility here is that you don't have a firm grasp on what exactly you think Microsoft did wrong and should be doing instead. It certainly doesn't come across in your writing.

Is there any evidence that any companies were willingly going along with PRISM? Seems like they were under gag orders and potential fines (Yahoo said $250K a day). Not sure what choice they had.

Though MS accessing user's data via Hotmail for internal review really does scuttle their credibility.

> Is there any evidence that any companies were willingly going along with PRISM? Seems like they were under gag orders and potential fines (Yahoo said $250K a day). Not sure what choice they had.

I'm not aware of any evidence of their intent, no, just that they assisted in collection. I believe Glenn Greenwald has stated that they were a willing and proactive participant, but that that information came from NSA internal forums and not official documentation so it would not be released.

I don't think it really matters though. Whether they were willing or not, the end result is the same. If you don't trust the USG, you cannot trust US corporations (yes, of course this applies not just to the US but others as well; it's just that we currently have more information about the fiveeyes programs, and the US is a big player geopolitically so they have interests to protect in a lot of areas).

On an more personal level, I would say that even if they collaborated with this under legal threats, they are still morally responsible for their decisions to support the surveillance state. I cannot accept that we give people or companies a clean slate for evil just because they had financial interests to protect. Everyone has financial interests to protect, and it's usually more convenient to ignore evil than to put oneself at risk.

I would say that even if they collaborated with this under legal threats, they are still morally responsible for their decisions to support the surveillance state

Perhaps, but at some point they have to be excused if they were complying with the law. It's our jobs as citizens to ensure we have the right laws. In a way, it's kind of like blaming the soldiers for the 2003 Iraq war. I don't blame them. I want them to fight their guts out believing that they are answering their highest calling (otherwise they lessen their odds of surviving it).

But I want the sonofabitch who sent them there and caused the deaths of all those innocent Iraqis to go to jail.

You gain a lot: connections, contracts, insider information and special privilege if you play nice with the government.

If it's a secret program, what do they really have to lose?

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