Hacker News Reader

Comment by scythe | Hacker News Reader

Suppose the people working in the US are required to tell the people in Ireland to give over the data, and the people in Ireland are required to refuse. Maybe they'd just have to have a really long argument on the phone until the court got tired of it.

View on HN

Then the people in the US would be sent to jail for contempt of court. Doesn't make sense, but that is how it works.

The court's argument could be that MS should be required to design their systems to make it possible to comply with their requests.

And if the people in the EU complied, they should similarly be held accountable under EU privacy and data protection rules. Either way, Microsoft and/or their employees personally wind up in serious legal trouble.

This is why Microsoft are in a Catch-22 situation, and why the correct solution for Europe is probably to just stand their ground until the US realises it has gone too far in expecting its laws to apply to the whole world and is now asking the impossible at the expense of its own business community.

So Microsoft US would tell Microsoft Ireland to do something and the local management don't do it why would Microsoft US be in contempt of court?

The US court orders something to be produced. If MS declines to produce it, then they are in contempt. MS's internal structure isn't of interest.

(Assuming the US court claims jurisdiction, which is more or less what this case is about)

Is it really an "internal" structure though - Microsoft US and Microsoft Ireland will be different legal entities. Of course, Microsoft US as the owner of Microsoft Ireland can tell their subsidiary to do something - but that doesn't mean that the management there will do it if it is illegal.

Presumably there is a way to challenge this though. If the court ordered Microsoft to produce a square circle could they still be found in contempt for failing to do so?

Reply on news.ycombinator.com