Microsoft admits scouring Hotmail user's e-mails even as it slams Google
Acknowledgment comes as it slams Google for doing same to deliver ads
Microsoft, which has skewered rival Google for going through customer e-mails to deliver ads, acknowledged it had searched e-mails in a blogger's Hotmail account to track down who was leaking company secrets.
John Frank, deputy general counsel for Microsoft, which owns Hotmail, had said in a statement on Thursday that the software company "took extraordinary actions in this case". In the future, he said, Microsoft would consult an outside attorney who was a former judge to determine if a court order would have allowed such a search.
The case involves former employee Alex Kibkalo, a Russian native who worked for Microsoft as a software architect in Lebanon.
According to an FBI complaint alleging theft of trade secrets, Microsoft found Kibkalo in September 2012 after examining the Hotmail account of the blogger with whom Kibkalo allegedly shared proprietary Microsoft code. The complaint filed on Monday in federal court in Seattle did not identify the blogger.
"After confirmation that the data was Microsoft's proprietary trade secret, on September 7, 2012, Microsoft's Office of Legal Compliance approved content pulls of the blogger's Hotmail account," says the complaint by FBI agent Armando Ramirez.
The search of the e-mail account occurred months before Microsoft provided Ramirez with the results of its internal investigation in July 2013.
The e-mail search uncovered messages from Kibkalo to the blogger containing fixes for the Windows 8 RT operating system before they were released publicly. The complaint alleges Kibkalo also shared a software development kit that could be used by hackers to understand more about how Microsoft uses product keys to activate software.