Google puts its foot down, says cops need a warrant before accessing Gmail accounts

Google (GOOG) has run into its own share of user privacy controversies in the past, but that hasn’t stopped the company from putting its foot down when it comes to giving law enforcement officials access to its users’ Gmail accounts. Per Ars Technica, Google spokesman Chris Gaither said flatly this week that Google requires “an ECPA search warrant” in order to “compel us to produce content in Gmail.” This is significant because, as Ars writes, law enforcement officials can often access private emails without first obtaining ECPA warrants, as with the recent sex scandal involving former CIA director David Petraeus “in which intimate e-mails were revealed despite the lack of any criminal action.”