I am not of the opinion that poor legislation or enforcement is a comprehensive excuse for unseemly corporate behavior.

"Unseemly corporate behavior?" If I had some sort of private hubski page that I never invited anyone to (I assume private pages will come at some point) and it turned out I was keeping notes on there regarding my spree of cell phone robberies, you would keep that from a judge?

The questions worth asking are- what are the circumstances that lead to something being asked for? What happens if a crime occurs on google chat or facebook chat- then is it alright to have the data released? What if I say I never murdered the person with a knife I ordered on Amazon the week before, that I deny ever owning such a knife- then is it ok for Amazon to out me?

It's easy to say "Private data shouldn't be brought into the public sphere" and smugly sit back, but that is the entire judicial process. My testimony, tax returns, words, and ideas are my property, but no one would dream that if someone is brought to court for tax evasion then it's an invasion of privacy to see what they filed for. No one would keep a witness from testifying because an assault happened in a supermarket and therefore it's the supermarket's data.

It's very easy to call this behavior "unseemly" when you imagine that Google is just letting the government check what porn its employees are looking at. But there is a point at which Google not giving up data is just withholding evidence. Drawing that line in the sand is not easy, and I do not envy the lawyers at Google who just what is allowed and what isn't.