An ex-Microsoft employee was recently arrested for allegedly leaking company secrets, all because Redmond found evidence against him in his contact’s Hotmail account.
Hold on, is it even legal for the company to go through someone’s account without permission? Well, according to Microsoft, it sure is — in fact, Hotmail’s Terms of Service apparently states that the company can “access or disclose information about you” for a number of reasons. Since Microsoft’s actions are quite dubious, it was forced to defend itself when news of the arrest broke.
The company says that while its ToS (which people don’t usually read) clearly states that it has the right to look through a user’s account, it does so “only in the most exceptional circumstances.” Microsoft also claims that it goes through a rigorous process when it wants access to someone’s digital missives.
In this particular case, the company says that while it didn’t have a court order to search the user’s emails and chat logs, a legal team did a thorough review of the case beforehand. All this, after Microsoft’s Scroogled ad campaign called Google out for scanning inboxes to identify data for advertising.
In a new statement, Microsoft vows to go through a more stringent process when it has to crack open a non-employee’s Hotmail/Outlook account. Aside from having a legal team assess whether a situation justifies a court order (which it did in this case), a former federal judge has to assess the evidence and come to the same conclusion, as well.
Also, the company promises to publish the number of accounts it searches on its bi-annual transparency report.
Source: Engadget