17 Dec 2017

Taking a stand for privacy

From Sunday Morning, 7:20 am on 17 December 2017

A landmark US Supreme Court case against a US citizen accused of drug trafficking has caught the eye of New Zealand' privacy commissioner, and prompted him to take a stand against the United States. The citizen has private data stored in an Irish data centre owned by Microsoft, and rather than ask Ireland to voluntarily hand over the information , the US wants to seize it under US search warrant laws. US government lawyers made a request in the US Court of Appeal, were knocked back, and they've now appealed that decision to the Supreme Court. The New Zealand privacy commissioner, John Edwards is worried about the global implications of such a case, and he's made a voluntary submission on to the US Supreme Court.