Ask HN: If technology is so good for the world, why are we becoming less happy?

This is why some companies have a separate org for eu data where no us citizen has access. the data is in the eu and when the company is told to provide it the eu employees whe are the only ones with the passwords to get it are legally required to refuse. The company may be required to fire those employees - but that is all they can do, and eu employee protection laws will jump in the middle. the next step is an international diplomatic issuse that I refuse to speculate on.

Qem · 3h ago

> the eu employees whe are the only ones with the passwords to get it are legally required to refuse

Can EU ever be sure Microsoft's mothership didn't backdoor the systems in use by the EU child-org, to bypass the local crew completely, just in case? Short of reimplementing everything in parallel from scratch, I doubt headquarters can really be completely locked out and be unable to get overseas data if they are hard pressed to do so by USG.

bluGill · 9m ago

No, but they can make that a crime and cost microsoft a lot if it discovered. And good rewards so whistleblowers are likely to come forward

vcfund · 1h ago

> Ultimately, the only likely way to avoid the risk of U.S. legal requests superseding Canadian or other international law is not to use the products of US-based organizations or to keep them disconnected entirely from the Internet.

impossiblefork · 3h ago

I don't understand this idea that Microsoft would follow US law in this case, since doing so would be espionage, and would lead to such long prison sentences for those who did it.

Obviously we've ended the death penalty for all crimes, but I think the police will shoot fleeing people who have participated in things like this.

Being part of an organization that says they will do this is also obviously grounds for being deported.

Don't think about participating in anything like this unless you have diplomatic immunity, because European states have no reason to go easy on someone who does this.

OgsyedIE · 2h ago

Alas, European states will generally not follow the letter of their law if it conflicts with the spirit of obeisance to the country that has all of the material power over their energy availability and software ecosystem, and with good reason.

impossiblefork · 2h ago

Here in Sweden I can assure you that the government won't be able to do anything about prosecutions of this sort. They don't have the legal powers to intervene.

We are also rather near Russia, and we have our laws for a reason. We're not going to apply anything less just because our government wants us to.

snackbroken · 1h ago

> Here in Sweden I can assure you that the government won't be able to do anything about prosecutions of this sort.

Tell this to Julian Assange, or to Peter Sunde, Fredrik Neij, Gottfrid Svartholm, and Carl Lundström. Though these are examples of government pressure in the opposite direction, they are still examples of how despite having no legal powers to intervene there is plenty of de-facto power being wielded by the U.S. over the Swedish justice system.

impossiblefork · 58m ago

All that is Interpol-type police co-operation stuff, not interference with our prosecution of spies.

Not having this of filth allowing third parties access to our data is foundational and I don't see how any interference with it could be justified. Historically you shot people like this.

metalman · 1h ago

The true title is,

Microsft, says US law takes precidence over Canadian law.

Microsoft says eh?, it's quite litteraly a declaration of war via lawfare, with the unspoken part bieng that Canada has already been compromised.

Just think how this is going down EVERYWHERE else in the world

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Microsoft says U.S. law takes precedence over Canadian data sovereignty

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