Google just handed it over like they do to literally any request from any law enforcement without giving it a second thought.
this post was submitted on 12 Feb 2026
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"Backend systems" so the servers then? It was on the servers.
I don’t expect the same would happen if the person wasn’t related to a TV personality.
Also, this brings into question whether deleted data is in fact deleted.
I suspect this is a bold-faced lie and they basically just had to ask Google for the footage, because Google doesn't follow their own policies or the law when it comes to privacy.
Deleted data is pretty much never immediately deleted. For drive storage the pointer to the location on the drive gets deleted, but the data is still there until it's overwritten. In databases it's flagged in a way where it's ignored by the system, but it's still there.
They weren’t doing disk level data recovery for this. At best it’s a backup but I suspect it’s just “back end” as in “we have it but the customer can’t see it until they pay for a subscription”
From what I've read they were doing disk level data recovery, just across multiple servers.
And they specifically say video from before you subscribe isn't available when you subscribe. I thought it was dumb because that's an easy selling point.
I don't know the details, but I'd expect an object store was being used (GCP Cloud Storage) and then the question is what the object retention policy is on each stage of the processing pipeline. It's possible that they had to go to the underlying storage, but it probably didn't even take that.
Clearly the "deleted" data isn't deleted, and you are right, if this were an ordinary person the police wouldn't have done a damn thing.
Yup, our 'security' comes from being unimportant nobodies. If for any reason The Powers That Be want to see 'security' footage, they'll find a way.