Microsoft has warned a US appeals court that forcing it to hand over emails stored on a server in Ireland would demolish internet user privacy worldwide in a “global free-for-all”. At the heart of the matter is a row over whether the Redmond giant should cough up messages held in an Irish data center – messages belonging to someone living in Dublin. US prosecutors chasing a drugs investigation sought a search warrant in the US to access the files, but Microsoft thinks the action should be taking place on Ireland’s soil, where the information is stored. Microsoft’s lawyer Joshua Rosenkranz told the New York court that if Uncle Sam could order multinational companies in America to give up data in systems in other countries, there’s no reason other nations couldn’t play similar games. Calling it a “matter of national sovereignty,” Rosenkranz added: “We would go crazy if China did it to us.”
