The federal Stored Communications Act bars the enforcement of a subpoena directed to an e-mail service provider to obtain the contents of an account-holder's e-mails, absent the consent of the account holder, a district court ruled. The court rejected the argument that the Act does not apply to the account holders because they are foreign citizens, reasoning that the Act applies because the e-mail provider and its servers are located in the U.S. Further, the court ordered the e-mails to be preserved pending the receipt of consent by the account holders, and directed the provider to disclose the date when the accounts were created, the actual names of the account holders provided at the time the accounts were created, and the countries from which the accounts were created.
In re Beluga Shipping Gmbh v. Suzlon Energy, 2010 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 104705 (N.D. Cal. Sept. 23, 2010) Download PDF
