The Brazilian Superior Court of Justice (SCJ) holds that Brazilian courts have jurisdiction to order the breach of secrecy of e-mails hosted outside of Brazil1.
In a special appeal, Microsoft questioned a Brazilian judicial order that aimed to identify the sender of some threatening messages sent from an email account associated with Microsoft itself. The company found out that those messages came from some accounts belonging to a person living in the United States, and, for that reason, Microsoft alleged that the breach of the email secrecy had to be confirmed by U.S. courts. Otherwise, there would be a violation of the U.S. laws.
The SCJ, through the reporter Justice Nancy Andrighi, held that the Civil Rights Framework for the Internet authorized Brazilian courts to order the breach of secrecy of email accounts from outside of Brazil, provided that at least one of the terminals involved in the act was located in Brazil. In this case, the alleged victim also lived in Brazil, reinforcing theBrazilian court’s jurisdiction to decide the case.
1Special Appeal1.745.657
More information available in Portuguese at:https://www.conjur.com.br/2020-nov-03/judiciario-pedir-quebra-sigilo-mail-fora-brasil