Finnish-based cell phone giant Nokia appears to have issued something of an ultimatum to the Finnish government—at least according to one of the country's newspapers, the Helsingin Sanomat. The news has been rejected as false by both Nokia and the Finnish Prime Minister. Company spokesperson Arja Suominen stated that "Nokia has in no way threatened to move," dismissing the newspaper's claim as "polemic...it contains many mistakes and misunderstandings."

Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen (I lufe-a Scundeenefiun nemes) also rejected the idea that Nokia had made such threats. As he told Finnish broadcast company Yle, "I have not heard about such an ultimatum. I have discussed (the law) with many companies including Nokia, and I have never heard that they have made such a threat." The paper claims to have spoken to an unnamed civil servant, who stated: "Nokia lobbied very hard for the proposed law to be unanimously approved... (The message) was very clear: if the law was not approved, Nokia would leave Finland."

Let's cut through the "she said/it said/the Swedish Chef said" and examine what we know. Nokia has been accused of illegally monitoring the email accounts of company employees on two separate occasions, first in 2001, and again in 2005. The Helsingin Sanomat's report does not make it clear whether or not any sort of official investigation was ever launched into Nokia's activities or if the company was found to be in violation of Finnish privacy statutes in a court of law. According to the paper's account, however, Nokia had no legal right to monitor the e-mail of specific employees, even if it did have reason to believe corporate secrets were being passed to its competitors, as was the case in both instances.

Fast-forward to late last year, and we also know that Nokia has been an ardent proponent of a law that's being referred to as "Lex Nokia." If passed, the "would would allow employers to investigate the log data of employees’ e-mails, if the company has reason to suspect that corporate secrets are leaking out of the company or that the employer’s communication networks are being misused." Supposedly, the employers would only be allowed to examine the sender, recipient, size of the message, volume of traffic, and "other matters related to email usage," but let's be honest here—if you're a company already examining such information and you aren't supposed to be, once you've actually got legal permission to do what you've been doing illicitly, is that going to be good enough? Probably not. No, now that you can legally do what you used to do illegally, it seems likely that you might take another step beyond, and accidentally hit "Enter."

The EU's policies on consumer data and privacy protection are generally held in high regard, but Nokia's dogged support for the Lex Nokia "snooping law" is a sign that companies within the EU may be chafing under restraints they aren't required to uphold elsewhere.

Whether or not Nokia has actually voiced a real threat (or would make good on it) isn't something you get company confirmation on until the company has decided to actually make a move. Regardless, it's interesting to see such a scenario playing out from a United States' perspective.

Listing image by Manuelle Zunelli