Microsoft is seeking for a federal judge to rollback a law that allows courts to restrict tech companies from telling customers that the government has gone after their data. This is important since much of our lives are personally tied to our devices which are ultimately in the hands of these huge companies.
Microsoft reveals that in the past 18 months federal courts have issued nearly 2,600 orders to keep the tech giant from alerting their customers that their data has been obtained by the US government. More than half of these orders have no fixed end date to them either.
Microsoft’s president and legal officer, Brad Smith, is very concerned as he states,
“This means that we are forever barred from speaking, and our customers are forever barred from hearing that government has accessed their email or other content. So this matters to people and the rights that all of us are entitled to enjoy under the constitution.”
Whenever we send an email or input data using our technological products, all of that information is stored and serviced on those company servers. Government is becoming increasingly aware of this, which is why they have shifted from investigating individuals physically to learning more about their suspects digitally. In this case, reaching out to tech companies to disclose personal information.
While this is something that may lead to an increase in criminal crackdowns and more security, this is can also be a gateway to an abuse of power. It was not too long ago when the the US government was attempting to bring Apple to court over creating a piece of hardware to access any iPhone device when they wanted.
It can’t be stressed enough the importance of transparency especially when all of our lives are tied to something so personally. Hopefully Microsoft will progress in their push to keep our data at a reasonable distance from hands that could possibly attempt to abuse it.
Source: The Washington Post
