Would you elaborate how this "in fact" is "protecting their citizens' rights"? Very curious to know.

Take this idea one step further. Microsoft, Google, et al also snoop on what foreign governments do with their software and report back to USGov.

Every government can and will compel companies within their jurisdiction to hand over data for legal cases.

Don’t think that this is a uniquely American property. If your data sits on servers within the control of any company that operates in a country, that country can and will apply legal pressure upon those companies to extract the data.

I'm not sure of your point. This is an excellent argument as to why the French government should run their government videoconferencing and chat on infrastructure in France, as they plan to do, isn't it? Using software that they have vetted. Regardless of if this is a "uniquely American" thing or not.

The point was in response to the above comment. All governments can and will compel companies to turn over data. It’s often framed on HN as a feature of only American companies but it’s actually universal.

But, in addition, the US government has recently become more pushy and less friendly than it was before, which is prompting many other nations to re-assess their dependence on the tech of what was until recently a close ally. The headline is an example.

It seems to me more about "this foreign government is most relevant" than "only this foreign government is like that".

> Microsoft, for example, cancelled Khan’s email address, forcing the prosecutor to move to Proton Mail, a Swiss email provider, ICC staffers said. His bank accounts in his home country of the U.K. have been blocked.

I don't think it's just that. It's also the increasingly plausible idea that the US government could pressure the EU by actually or threatening to control, throttle or tax EU access to online platforms such as Zoom, Teams, MS Office, Google docs, Azure or AWS.