WTF Microsoft?

I just can't believe my eyes:

http://www.seattlepi.com/local/article/Ex-Microsoft-employee-charged-with-passing-5331715.php

 

So Microsoft has - without warrant - spied upon a French national by tapping his private messaging, whereas this person clearly indicated to want to remain anonymous?

Then they didn't inform the authorities or file complaint under suspicion that a crime was committed, but held an internal investigation whereby they had private security personnel interrogate a person without the presence of a lawyer or an actual police or DA person, in which they got a confession out of that person...

Then they made an evidence file internally (thereby rendering impossible any objective evidence gathering by official investigative authorities!). One thing comes to mind: they framed him by doctoring evidence for another year while letting him work there.

They didn't contact the FBI until a year after the facts? And the FBI arrested the man after all these fundamental rights violations by Microsoft, and based on the evidence file presented by Microsoft a year after the facts?

 

Oh wow, things are much worse in the US than I would have thought. When I read that, I'm surprised the Microsoft enforcers didn't just lynch the guy or "make it look like an accident". This is beyond civilization, this is so deeply wrong that there are no words for it anymore. This is Microsoft taking a crap on the very basic principles of the Bill of Rights. I knew Microsoft had no respect for their customers, but this is of another level, this is absolutely disgusting. Don Gates should meet his Valentine's Day for this. This is really bad!

Yup, next they will be just knocking off the enemies. Yes, it is pretty bad in the U.S. It almost one more thing and its martial law with the people declaring revolution. We need to fire our government and hopefully get something other then greedy , corrupt bastards that dont give a fuck about anything but themselves.

I really need to stop watching the world news. I have a bomb shelter to build.

I don't think that will ever happen. It seems to me that a vast majority of those attracted to politics are the greedy and corrupt. 

Well, the politicians. I don't think there's very many political scientists who are greedy or corrupt, or at least not any more than any other occupation.

The thing that is probably the most disturbing, is that they didn't fire the guy immediately, waiving the right to fire him for causes, probably with the idea of "making it look like an accident" in due time, but then they realized that by waiving the right to fire him for causes, they would still have to pay him benefits and couldn't claim damages, so they decided to call the FBI, in the hope that he'll be sentenced, which would create a new event they could use to fire him for causes without benefits, as well as file for damages.

They just calculate, they don't even think about the law or elementary rights, they truly consider themselves above the law. This should be given so much public attention, that everyone would see the true nature of the software mafia and how far they're going.

It will certainly have repercussions for Microsoft, in particular with regards to the acute lack of trust outside of the US, but if it remains without consequences in the US, then the US is truly doomed, because this is much worse than the NSA Scandal, this is really ugly, and a sign that the US government has lost control over the corporate mafia completely. This is the worst case of the US justice system and constitutional rights framework losing face that I've seen in a long time. If the US government doesn't react to this with maximum prejudice against Microsoft, they entire US democracy is dead as a donkey. What the NSA does, is nothing in comparison to what the US corporations do. If Microsoft does this kind of thing, Google, Facebook, etc... do exactly the same. If they are prepared to violate the most basic rights of a person in this way, they probably also won't hesitate to frame people by manipulating data or even faking hacks to cover up their own thieving streaks. This is so perverted and wrong, that it demands extreme sanctions by the government, because this is Russian oligarch stuff, it doesn't belong in a civilized society.

In the United States communication over your employer's network is not considered private.

Yup, it isn't anywhere else either. That's just not the point here.

The French blogger was not a Microsoft employee, he was not located in the US, even the FBI has no jurisdiction to look at his chats, let alone hack into his computer, they have to request cooperation from the French Juge d'instruction in such cases. They used the Windows backdoor technology (Trusted Computing department is the department at Microsoft that guards the backdoors they rent out to the NSA and other governmental institutions and corporations that pay for it, just checking someones chat history is something that the Hotmail department could easily have done...).

Microsoft held up the Russian guy's employment with illicit intent. That equals unilateral termination, so whatever Microsoft tapped into the communications of the guy while he was at Microsoft, was illegal.

Microsoft had the guy not only investigated, but also interrogated by private security personnel, denying him legal assistance and 4th and 5th Amendment rights (and even if they say that he didn't have those because he was not an American citizen, that would be even worse, because not only would it be a violation of the UN manifest and the UN Human Rights, but it would mean that they support the viewpoint that non-US citizens don't have human rights, a viewpoint for which the US diplomatic corps at the UN was burned already), and they even squeezed a confession out of him in those circumstances... how bad can it get...

I hate to be in the position of defending Microsoft.  I loathe them as a company and loathe their products even more.

But is there more to the article than what you linked?  Or is there another article that provides more information?

The article mainly talks about a Russian national, Kibkalo, who worked for Microsoft in Russia—I think, the article is a bit ambiguous—and also in Lebanon—I assume the country and not Lebanon, PA or Lebanon, TN.

The only thing the linked article says is that Kibkalo communicated with a French Technology blogger.  It does not say the French blogger was arrested or has even been charged with anything.  It does say that Microsoft searched the bloggers Hotmail account and his IMs.  Microsoft owns Hotmail, and they can search Hotmail accounts if they want.  He should not have used Hotmail if he was planning to publicize IP stolen from Microsoft.  Likewise, if he was using an IM service owned by Microsoft—the article does not say which one he used—Microsoft can search the IM service’s audit logs.  They own it.

The article does not provide a timeline for any of the events, other than there were correspondences between Kibkalo and the blogger in mid-2012 and between the blogger and another Microsoft employee in September of 2012.

The article does not say when Kibkalo was fired, how long it took for the investigation to determine Kibkalo was the person they believe perpetrated the crime.  It does not even provide a timeline for when Microsoft contacted the FBI.  Kibkalo was arrested today, but there is no mention of how long the FBI has been investigating this crime. The article is pretty poorly written.

If you have another article that provides more details, I would love to read it.  This whole thing is very interesting.

As far as Kibkalo being questioned by Microsoft investigators without a lawyer, I don’t know what the laws are like Russia or Lebanon—where the article seems to state Kibkalo worked.  However, even in the US Microsoft can certainly have its investigators speak to one of its employees.  He is not compelled to answer the investigators' questions.  The details surrounding his confession could be interesting.  If he was questioned in the US, and he was threatened, held against his will, or harmed, he could certainly sue Microsoft for damages.  And there would be an army of lawyers salivating to take his case.  However, if he was questioned in Russia or Lebanon, who knows what protections he has, probably none, especially in Russia.

Nope, he started in Russia, then worked in Lebanon, then worked in Redmond, where the alleged exchange with the French blogger happened, because the article says that in the exchange with the blogger, he supposedly sneaked into a Redmond building. So everything happened in the US. He was also arrested in Seattle.

Yeah, it looks like I missed the part about the FBI investigating the crime since July 2013.  Like I said, the article is pretty poorly written.  It says:

                “Kibkalo, a Russian national who worked there and in Lebanon for Microsoft, also alleged to have stolen …”

This implies he worked in Russia and Lebanon.  At the beginning of the article, it says he broke into Microsoft HQ and also at the end it says he snuck into Microsoft HQ, sort of implying that that was not his home work location.  I don’t know about Microsoft, but for many multisite companies, your corporate badge is enough to get you access to any company building.  And if he was a disgruntled employee, it would not surprise me to learn he flew to Seattle, just to screw Microsoft.  I did see he was arrested in Seattle, but it did not say under what circumstances, did he live there?  Was he extradited from Lebanon?  Did Microsoft “conveniently” schedule a meeting in Redmond he had to attend?  I would not put that past Microsoft either.  That is where listing when he was fired would be helpful.  Like I said, it’s just a poorly written article.

Interesting though.

So it's a lot worse even than I feared when I read the above article.

http://docs.dpaq.de/6768-blogcomp.pdf

Apparently, the guy was a Russian national that was working in Lebanon at the time of the facts, so Microsoft is clearly in direct violation of a long list of International Law, and apparently, they state that they got a mandate to search his private e-mails from their internal legal department!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So they disregarded a person's rights under another legal system and under the UN manifest, based on the Microsoft Hotmail Terms of Service?

No Terms of Service supersede the law, and especially not human rights. They admit having interrogated the guy for two days (!!!!!!!) before getting a confession out of him. What the hell did they do?

He wasn't even in Microsoft's employment any more when they were still investigating him!

Here is the funny part. He built a vm in their system collected the code. Stored it on Skydrive (he he) then emailed with hotmail or outlook( lol lol lol.) Thats some funny stuff  :)~ But yes it sucks they way they handled it.

"28. KIBKALO was interviewed by Microsoft TWCI over the course of two days.". It doesn't say that he was interrogated for two days straight. He might have had one hour long interview each day, or two interviews per day, or three per day, you understand what I mean. On the other hand, it doesn't specifically say that he was NOT interrogated for two days straight.

"30. Among the items found in the blogger's home [..]". Did Microsoft search the blogger's home? I pray to god this happened after the authorities were informed about the supposed theft. Because if not... how the hell can Microsoft do this? I mean, physically, how can Microsoft search someone's home? This is too horrible to even consider. EDIT: The only explanation that I can find is that Microsoft employees indeed searched the blogger's home. FBI doesn't have jurisdiction in France. Microsoft, burn.

I hope people realize how sociopathic Microsoft is, and kill it with fire.

I think it probably was done by the French police. But there couldn't have been probable cause, because any probable cause provided would have been the result of Microsoft violating his private mails, the mails of a French national living in France, using his French hotmail account to communicate with a Russian mail.ru account of the Microsoft employee. French law does not permit this. When the FBI inquired with the French juge d'instruction for a search at the bloggers home, they must have used false pretexts, possibly false doctored evidence provided by Microsoft, there is simply no other possibility to warrant the issue of a search warrant under French law based on these facts. The French police itself has used a custom version of Ubuntu for years, they're not Microsoft customers themselves, there can be no interference there. It's a very bad case of organized human rights violations and international justice fraud.

To be honest, I hope Microsoft gets banned for this from a lot of markets, these are drugs cartel practices, they are unbecoming of a commercial corporation.

Makes you think twice about the "charity work" Gates does, doesn't it. A typical example of kissing babies whilst stealing their lollies... it's just disgusting.

Microsoft invokes Terms of Service of a so-called "WIP" service, that they say apply to the Microsoft employee, to break into accounts of a French national living in France, that communicated with a mail.ru mail account of the Russian Microsoft employee living in Russia... who the hell does Microsoft think they are?

This clearly shows that Microsoft is without any doubt the most ruthless and plain criminal software ad services company out there. It serves them right that they've been losing so much business, just like the rest of those rights violators out there (Cisco, IBM, etc...)

What is very disturbing, is that the "Trusted Computing" team is the very team that Microsoft pushed forwards to the EU as the instance that makes sure that there is no backdoor in the closed Microsoft code. I guess we all know what the truth is now.

I guess this is proof of Microsoft's Pont-St.Esprit, and I hope a lot of people all over the world, but especially in the EU, learn from this and see how evil Microsoft really is.

I will preface my statements yet again by saying how much I hate Microsoft.  I puke a little into my mouth every time I have to write code in a Windows environment.

So it looks like many of my original assumptions were correct.  Kibkalo was never employed by Microsoft in the US.  He only worked in Russia and Lebanon.  He traveled on his own to Redmond and use his Microsoft corporate badge to gain access to Microsoft HQ, with the intent of stealing Microsoft IP.

I have to say those are some of the most interesting charging documents I have ever read.  I think LOL will go down in history as the next great "famous last words."

With regards to the blogger, more than likely Microsoft offered him immunity in exchange for his cooperation in gathering information about Kibkalo's activities. The blogger has not been charged with anything even though knowingly distributing stolen IP is also a crime.

The charging documents do not state what country the Hotmail account was located in.  But more than likely it was a US or maybe a Canada based Hotmail account, since the blogger first claimed to be from Quebec and tried to through investigators off his trail.  If he used a Hotmail account in France, then they would know he was in France.  Microsoft did not get a "mandate" from their legal department.  They asked their legal department if they were allowed to search the Hotmail email account based on the Terms of Service.  Emails stored in Hotmail are not private.  You have no expectations of privacy using Hotmail, especially using it with the intent to commit criminal activity.  Like I said, why on God's earth would you use Hotmail and Microsoft IM to correspond about criminal activity related to Microsoft.

The charging documents say Microsoft found out Kibkalo planned to leave Microsoft prior to interviewing him about the IP theft.  So, I do not even understand why he agreed to speak to them in the first place.  And it just says they interviewed him for two days, it does not say they locked him in a basement, tied him to a chair and questioned him for two days until he confessed.  It does not say they did not, but more than likely they did not.  They just interviewed him over the course of two days.  They probably had questions for him on day one, and after reviewing his answers, came back on day two to ask him more questions.

My opinion and this is just an opinion is that he probably admitted to stealing the IP because he did not think Microsoft could do anything to him since he was not in the US.  And this was sort of a final F U to Microsoft right before he left.

The charging documents further state that he left Microsoft and gained employment with another US tech company back in Russia in St Petersburg and Moscow.  The real question is if he was safe and sound back in Russia--I doubt Russia would extradite him to the US, especially given the current tensions of the past few months.  What was he doing in Seattle when he was arrested?

Did the FBI arrange with his current US employer for Kibkalo to have a meeting in Seattle that he had to "conveniently" attend?  And again if I were in Kibkalo's situation, I doubt I would ever set foot on US soil.

There are bigger things to get angry at Microsoft for than this, like inflicting Windows on the world for one that in itself constitutes a crime against humanity.

However, if it is discovered that Kibkalo was kidnapped from Russia by some private security firm, then that is a serious problem, and Microsoft needs to be held accountable for that.

Nope, art. 226-15 Cp (Code Pénal), the country the account was situated in makes no difference, it concerns a French citizen. The fact that Microsoft even has the technical ability to intercept or read the emails, is a crime in France:

Article 226-15

Le fait, commis de mauvaise foi, d'ouvrir, de supprimer, de retarder ou de détourner des correspondances arrivées ou non à destination et adressées à des tiers, ou d'en prendre frauduleusement connaissance, est puni d'un an d'emprisonnement et de 45 000 euros d'amende.

Est puni des mêmes peines le fait, commis de mauvaise foi, d'intercepter, de détourner, d'utiliser ou de divulguer des correspondances émises, transmises ou reçues par la voie électronique ou de procéder à l'installation d'appareils de nature à permettre la réalisation de telles interceptions.

 

Microsoft was not "of good faith", because the blogger clearly didn't want to divulge his identity to Microsoft, so they couldn't have engaged in a bonafide interaction with the blogger.

 

Other than that: The European Convention on Human Rights, art. 8, includes the rights to privacy in correspondence, and it has been made clear that this includes electronic correspondence by the Strassbourg Court, inter alia in the the Liberty v UK case of 2008, in which the GCHQ was already condemned for their privacy invasion practices by the European Human Rights Court, well before the NSA Scandal.

Other than that: Article 5 of the European Directive 97/66 explicitly states that all member states shall enforce communications privacy over all kinds of data networks.

 

It's just completely illegal, whatever the circumstances, and a direct violation of multiple human rights principles and criminal law articles. Microsoft just couldn't have done it, whatever the case.

The French blogger also did never release any Microsoft code, he clearly confirmed in his communications that he didn't intend to do so because he thought it would be illegal, even though that is very much open for debate.

Microsoft couldn't have offered the Blogger immunity from any legal prosecution, because he never committed any crime, and there was never any probable cause to even mandate a criminal investigation against him, that would allow for a legal search or breach of the confidentiality of his communications.

 

The very fact that Microsoft (or any other mail service provider) CAN read the hotmail communications of a user, is a violation of art. 226-15 C.p. in France. Combined with the EC directive 97/66, Microsoft is in violation of the law if it doesn't provide the technical means to exclude the violation of the privacy of the communications of the users.

 

This is not a small thing, this is a major human rights and criminal law breach by Microsoft.

One thing that could happen to help instill an ongoing fear in corrupt politicians both present and future, is something like this happening:

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-22895606

Raid them all, raid all the congress and their offices at the same time, turn all the drawers upside down, go through every shelf, backup every computer in sight and its content for future analysis. Total crackdown, spontaneous, massive and total, by hundreds if not thousands of police officers and detectives. Something like this i needed.

 

Fine, I guess I will play the role of Microsoft advocate.  I will have to shower later, but OK.  I guess I should have been a lawyer instead of a Software Engineer because I can actually put emotions aside and defend people I despise.

I will have to disagree with you.  If the account is located in the US and all content with regards to the account is in the US, then US law would apply not French.  The nationality of the account owner is irrelevant.  France or any other country in Europe can pass all the laws they like, but if it concerns US assets located on US soil, it does not matter.

That would be tantamount to saying France can pass a law that makes it illegal in New York State for people to use Twitter, and that law would be binding.

And it does not matter what European law bestows what guaranteed right of privacy on its citizens.  European law does not apply to the US.  Just as US law does not apply to Europe.  Well, there is one exception to this.  Sometimes injunctions and judgments issued by UK and US judges are enforceable in both countries.  This is only because the UK and US systems of jurisprudence are very similar.  An example of this was Louise Woodward, a British au pair, was convicted of killing her employer’s baby in Massachusetts.  She was released after a very short time in prison, but a Massachusetts judge issued an injunction forbidding her from profiting from the incident by writing a book or making a movie.  The injunction was honored in the UK.

Likewise, whatever international law or convention you want cite does not apply in the US.  Unless the international  law or convention has been signed by the President and ratified by the US Senate.

First, even knowingly possessing stolen IP is a crime, but you are wrong about the French blogger not releasing illegally stolen Microsoft IP.  Kibkalo updated it to his Sky Drive account, sent the blogger the links, the blogger downloaded it, and forwarded it.  From the charging documents:

                “13.  The source indicated that the blogger contacted the source using a Microsoft Hotmail e-mail address that TWCI had previously connected to the blogger.  After confirmation that the data was Microsoft’s proprietary trade secret, on September 7, 2012 Microsoft’s Office of Legal Compliance (OLC) approved content pulls of the blogger’s Hotmail account”

And:

“17.  While reviewing the blogger’s e-mail account, Microsoft also located Instant Message(IM) communications between the blogger and KIBKALO on or around September 09, 2012, in which they discussed the logistics of exchanging data amongst themselves.  A subsequent review of KIBKALO’s accounts found references to the Activation Server SDK sample code in the unallocated clusters of the virtual machine used by KIBKALO, as well as in the log file for KIBKALO’s SkyDrive account.  The sample code in KIBKALO’s accounts was the same sample code that the Microsoft source received from the blogger, prompting Microsoft’s investigation”

So, he released it to at least one person, “the source.”  “The source” was probably somehow connected to Microsoft, was scared when he received it because he knew having it violated his NDA, so he contacted Microsoft management.  Plus, the blogger’s IM trail clearly shows he at least attempted to distribute known stolen Microsoft IP to a “hacker,” we do not know for sure it he succeeded.  He said he would ask his “hacker” friend if he was interested.  He does mention that what Kibkalo was doing is highly illegal, but does not make any objections to it, and it must not have concerned him too much since he did download the stolen IP.

The simplest explanation is probably what is true.  Whether or not Microsoft could have the blogger legally prosecuted is not the point.  Microsoft probably confronted him with the evidence they had told him they were going to have him prosecuted unless he cooperated—whether they could or not is not important—the blogger got scared, “rolled over” on his friend, and told Microsoft everything.  That is a standard tactic investigators use, both public and private.  Again the blogger had the right not to say anything to Microsoft, but he was most likely scared because he knew he was engaging in illegal or at least “grey area” activity.

And I have to disagree with you; the entire proceeding with regards to the French blogger is much ado about nothing.

The real question is what was Kibkalo doing in the US and how did he get there.  Was he living in the US?  Was he tricked into coming to the US?  Was he kidnapped?

If he was kidnapped, then that is a very big deal, and Microsoft needs to be held accountable for it.

But the rest of this is just pure sensationalism.

You can fault Microsoft for many things—many, many things.  But investigating how and who stole and released their crappy IP to the public is not one of them.  If they engaged in any tangible criminal actively—like kidnapping, then whoever is responsible at Microsoft needs to be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law.

Nope, if an American murders someone in France, he's committing a crime.

According to your theory, if a French citizen living in France would send a letter to a Russian citizen living in Russia or Lebanon, using UPS as a mail courier, UPS being a US company, could break the confidentiality of the mail, and would not commit a crime according to French criminal law? Makes no sense at all.

If Microsoft wants to do business in a country, it has to abide by the laws of that country, period.

Art. 17 of the UN Covenant on civil and political rights, which has been signed, but together with Cambodia, Honduras and Liberia, has not yet been ratified by the United States (now that's nice company to be in!), explicitly states the same, which means that since the correspondence was between ratifying countries, France and Lebanon, Microsoft doesn't stand a chance of arguing against a huge UN civil and political rights violation, they simply cannot invoke any arguments against it even, because the US hasn't ratified yet, even though they cooperated in the making of the Covenant, and have signed it.

But the US did ratify and sign the UN Universal declaration of Human Rights, of which Article 12 confirms exactly the same right that has been violated by Microsoft. I would also want to draw your attention to articles 19 and 30 of the UN Universal declaration of Human Rights, which give the blogger the right to gather any information whatsoever, even if that is controversial information. Getting information sent to you is not a crime, and verifying the authenticity of such information is not a crime either. If the US supports Microsoft in it's human rights violations, that is an act described by Article 30 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

These are human rights, there are not civil rights, they are the rights that are deemed to belong to every human being, regardless of nationality, of where the human being lives, who the human being is, and what he is (falsely) accused of. Articles 6 to 11 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights should further enlighten you on the subject of how bad the things are that Microsoft has done. Microsoft has literally violated almost half of the articles of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Even if the countries in which the breach of human rights were Shariah countries that would reject the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and instead would adhere to the Cairo Declaration of Islamic Human Rights (most countries that accepted the CDHRI also have ratified the UNUDHR by the way), and even if the sender and receiver would be lesbian Jewish women, even then Microsoft would have violated human rights. There is just no way to get around this, this really happened, which ever way you twist and turn it, Microsoft has - without legal warrant - flagrantly violated the human rights of at least one person, the French Blogger, and most probably also of the Russian ex-employee, and the FBI has probably aided and abetted by issuing a request to the French juge d'instruction for a search warrant without proper probable cause.

This is not sensationalist, it's impossible to overestimate the gravity of these acts. This is exactly the kind of thing the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was made for in 1948, to prevent practices like this, that had also been practised by the NSDAP offices before they even were part of the government and later the Gestapo, when the NSDAP came to power. If you accept that a private organization can lift human rights based on terms of service that are only valid in some foreign jurisdiction, you have just lost connection with the very principles of human rights. This cannot be punished enough, and is a clear wake-up call to the world about what's going on. This most urgently needs to be addressed, suppressed and punished with maximum prejudice. The NSA scandal is nothing in comparison to the crimes committed here by Microsoft as a private corporation.

Nope, your argument is not valid.

When tech companies open offices in foreign countries, usually these are separate entities from their US parent companies.  So Microsoft US is a separate entity from Microsoft France.  I have worked at several tech companies in Silicon Valley and this is the norm.  They do this to protect themselves from things like this.  This is exactly how Apple avoided paying US taxes on much of their profits.

So, if the blogger used a US based Hotmail account, then US law is what applies, not French.

Using your logic, if a French National comes to the US and rents a storage unit--most storage unit companies reserve the right to search your storage unit, in case you are attempting to store things they do not allow, drugs being one of them.  Then the French National returns to France.  Shortly after that the owner of the storage unit company receives information that the French National was involved in the drug trade.  So using your argument, if the owner of the storage unit company decides to search the French National's storage unit--allowed under the Terms of Use, he is in violation of French and international law for violating the French National's right to privacy.  That just does not hold water, even if the storage unit company had a separate French entity. 

I have read the text of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.  And I do not see how even the loosest of interpretations of the articles you listed could constitute anywhere near a violation of the French blogger's human rights.

Here is the text of article 12:

"No one shall be subjected to arbitrary interference with his privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to attacks upon his honour and reputation. Everyone has the right to the protection of the law against such interference or attacks."

Microsoft did not arbitrarily interfere with the privacy of the French blogger.  The blogger used a Hotmail account to forward illegal IP to a third party who reported the blogger.  No violation.

Here's the text of article 19 and 30:

"Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers."

"Nothing in this Declaration may be interpreted as implying for any State, group or person any right to engage in any activity or to perform any act aimed at the destruction of any of the rights and freedoms set forth herein."

How do either of these two articles give the blogger the right to illegally obtain stolen IP and distribute it?  So you are saying that if the French blogger were to transport a stolen copy of the Magna Carta (information)--that he did not steal but knows was stolen--across international boarders, this would protect him?  No

I will not list the text for articles 6-11, but all they say is everyone has a right to a fair trial, everyone is presumed innocent until proven guilty, and other things most of which is already guaranteed by the US Constitution.

I think you are falling into the same trap with the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights that many Americans fall into with the US Constitution.  The US Constitution gives everyone the right of Freedom of Speech.  But the Constitution only protects you from the Government abridging your Freedom of Speech.  Meaning you can say basically anything you want and the Government cannot penalize you for it.  However, private companies certainly can.  A private company can fire you for making statements they disagree with or posting things on Facebook they do not like.  The US or State governments cannot prevent you from owning a firearm, but a private apartment complex can prevent you from keeping one on their property.  The UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights is to protect you from your government violating your human rights.

I will say it again Microsoft did not violate the blogger's rights to privacy.  He had no right to privacy when using a private company's US based assets.

You are practicing sensationalism, almost bordering on tinfoil hat country.  You are reading all types of things into this case like a conspiracy between the FBI and Microsoft, the FBI lying to French magistrates, and Microsoft holding a private citizen captive for two days. None of this is mentioned in either the news article or charging documents you posted.  This is your own opinion and has no basis in the currently known facts of the case.

My explanation of how Microsoft probably got access to the blogger's house is also speculation, but does not include any wild conspiracy theories and is probably closer to what actually happened.

I know you are German, but I don't think you want to get into an argument with me about how the Nazis came to power in Germany.  I have read The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich and other books covering this era of history--although none are as thorough as Shirer's masterpiece.  And the tactics the Nazi thugs used prior to coming to power in pre-war Germany are a lot more complicated than you state.  And to be honest if we started talking about this, this thread would be locked and any thread we started on such a topic would be deleted by the admins, as I have seen in the past.  So it is not even worth it.