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It looks like the US Government's got another headache on it's hands. The thing about lawsuits is - they go both ways. So when NSA/FBI and the rest of the alphabet boys came after Apple throwing lawsuits around they've left themselves open to counter suits from corporations subject to their gag order tactics.
Now Microsoft's stepping up and few people are reporting in this, but it's very critical people understand what's at stake ad individuals who use cloud services. Microsoft gets served with court orders all the time, but in normal course an individual is notified "hey big brother and gang are looking into you", but when it comes to online data there has been a disconnect and 48% of the federal requests were accompanied with gag orders, which Microsoft is alleging is unconstitutional. More than 2/3rd of the gag order do not have a fixed end date, so apparently it's just forever.
"People do not give up their rights when they move their private information from physical storage to the cloud," Microsoft says in the lawsuit. It adds that the government "has exploited the transition to cloud computing as a means of expanding its power to conduct secret investigations."
Sauces:
- Business imperatives drove Microsoft to sue U.S. government
- Microsoft sues US government over 'unconstitutional' cloud data searches
- Microsoft sues U.S. government over data requests
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Here is the real problem which is a bit baffling that most people don't understand this about cloud services. When I have private data on my personal desktop in order for the government to get that data they need a search warrant for that desktop. I as an individual am fully aware of that warrant and what's going on. Constitutionally I can now make moves to hire a lawyer and protect myself for the coming shit storm.
But here is the problem when you turn on these cloud storage services, your private data is no longer just on your computer, it's in some random server somewhere on the internet and copied over who knows how many times in backups. Basically anyone smart enough can get access to your data without you knowing about it. But in my scenario it's very difficult to get access to data on my computer without me knowing about it.
Let's take another scenario, imagine your car is in your driveway. Your car is in your possession, you know where your car is located at all times. No one in their right mind would let their car just be parked by someone else "wherever" for "anyone" with a brain or court order to get access to it WITHOUT you knowing about it. You wouldn't let your car be left in some unknown location randomly around the world. So if law enforcement folks want to search your car they have to get a search warrant and then serve it, then get to search your car, cause it's in your physical possession.
It's the same scenario with your data on your computer... until you enable icloud, Google Drive, Microsoft Azure, Dropbox, and the dozen other cloud storage options. Now your private data, photos, contacts, emails, videos, and whatever is basically "Where-ever". WTF? Really think about that, there are private photos and videos of you stored "somewhere" on the internet, copied over who knows how many times, and backed up to infinity. There literally is no way for you to ever delete everything either, cause you put it in the care of someone else, who's name you don't know. So now all the law enforcement has to do is get a search warrant, - Microsoft's arguing that the individual should be informed, or god-forbidden a hacker group comes along and pulls an "Ashley Madison" or "The Fappening", bam you're fucked.
Now recall the Apple versus FBI case, Apple had ALREADY gave backups of everything that iPhone had to the FBI upto 6 weeks before the killings. The FBI ALREADY has every text message you send (unless with iMessanger or WhatsApp - end-to-end encryption), since it goes through the phone company. The FBI ALREADY has every phone call made, what they wanted was the data on that iPhone cause it wasn't already accessible to them. If data is in a single place, the proper process of getting a search warrant works the correct way, come get the data.
But now all these cloud storage situations have TONS of people's data just randomly on servers - imagine all those cloud storages who were using Amazon... Have you ever heard of Amazon trying to protect privacy and rights? No, cause they aren't a communications company they are a commerce company. So Amazon does what it always does, lays down. So even if the government gets legally blocked by Dropbox, they could go straight to Amazon (Note: Dropbox has moved from Amazon's servers cause of expansion, so that's no longer the case). You have to understand the multiple levels hackers/the government can get your data when it's no longer in a singular place (legally and illegally).
What's really struck me was I personally never thought people would put their documents and data online to the degree they have. I never thought cloud storage would catch on cause it's way too risky. I always assumed people realized that once it's on the internet it's not really private anymore. Yeah my personal computer can get hacked and all, but I can also defend against that when my data is in a singular location. I can put protection on it and use external drives for more sensative information, etc. But the second that data is on a cloud storage, you might as well call it a day if you are doing anything questionable. But it's not even about doing anything illegal just look at the Fappening. ALL of those celebrities had their default icloud and cloud storage settings on, all photos uploaded to the cloud, just crazy shit that I never dreamed people would do.
It literally baffles me that people don't understand the problems with storing their data on other people's servers and thinking it can be 100% secure. I have as much of that shit turned off as possible. It's crazy too how much data is already enabled that you have to hunt to turn it off. I got it to the point Siri can't figure out what planet she's on. I don't allow my camera to have access to GPS, cause come on... you can figure that one out.
Well anyways, with Microsoft's situation they have customers apprehensive from putting their data in the cloud since if government serves warrants the customers won't even know about them let alone try to defend against them, making this an interesting life or death situation for Microsoft's cloud storage endeavors.
What's really crazy, and I suspect this will start happening, I feel that if there more government encroachment on these services, in order to combat user privacy a lot of companies will start re-thinking that 'infinity storage' and become a bit more like 4chan where they expire data more and more - since in the long run it'll also reduce storage costs. I mean does the system really need to store and still keep server logs from 1993 of my CompuServe days? Why keep that added increasing costs. I understand a Facebook or Twitter keeping data, but if I delete a file in my cloud storage, what's the point of keeping backup copies for years and decades?
I see a situation where the obsession of "keeping all data, activity, and whatever the user does on the system" forever being replaced with "delete it ASAP and fuck all these headaches".
So my question is - Does anyone here use cloud storage to store serious shit? And if so, WHY?
