Supreme Court Tosses Out Microsoft Case on Digital Data Abroad

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The Supreme Court announced that it would not decide whether federal prosecutors can force Microsoft to turn over digital data stored outside the United States. The move followed arguments in the case in February and the enactment of a new federal law that both sides said made the case moot.

“No live dispute remains between the parties,” the court said in a brief, unsigned opinion. The case, United States v. Microsoft, No. 17-2, had seemed poised to be one of the most important of the current term. It posed the question of whether a 1986 law, enacted before the dawn of the big-data era, applied to digital information stored outside the nation’s borders. When the case was argued, several justices said Congress rather than the court should act to define the limits of privacy in the digital age. Congress did. On March 23, it enacted the Cloud Act — more formally, the Clarifying Lawful Overseas Use of Data Act. The new law, unlike the one from 1986, clearly applied to data held overseas.


Supreme Court Tosses Out Microsoft Case on Digital Data Abroad