This case may be the leading edge of a huge wave with a global sweep.
The sticky point may be that the locality of data is impermanent and ambiguous. In the MS case, though the data is said to be stored on a server in Ireland, it could just as well be distributed, moved or duplicated anywhere, and for all we know it already has been.
Eventually laws will have to come to terms with the implications of the Internet: data, like a flock of migratory birds, for its own reasons goes one place to another and knows nothing about national boundaries.
The sticky point may be that the locality of data is impermanent and ambiguous. In the MS case, though the data is said to be stored on a server in Ireland, it could just as well be distributed, moved or duplicated anywhere, and for all we know it already has been.
Eventually laws will have to come to terms with the implications of the Internet: data, like a flock of migratory birds, for its own reasons goes one place to another and knows nothing about national boundaries.