Microsoft: Customers trust us much less since NSA scandal

Vendor to open 'transparency centres' for concerned customers to check cloud services for back doors

Microsoft has admitted that trust in its cloud services has plummeted in some areas since the NSA scandal broke last summer.

Last June, ex-US National Security Agency (NSA) analyst and now-fugitive Edward Snowden leaked documents claiming the organisation accessed user data from top tech vendors such as Microsoft, Apple and Facebook.

The vendors have vehemently denied any complicity and many have since launched or accelerated privacy campaigns lobbying the US government to crack down on privacy issues in order to preserve – or win back – customer trust.

Microsoft admitted that, since the scandal broke, it has seen concrete evidence that trust in its services is plummeting.

At a Gigaom event yesterday, the vendor's general counsel Brad Smith said in some key cities such as Brussels, Berlin and Brasília, its internal tracker – which judges customers' views on the firm – shows trust in its services has declined in the double digits.

"I just think that one of fundamental prerequisites for being in the cloud business is that you must offer services that people trust," he said. "[Customers are] not going to put their most valuable information in your datacentre or use a service if they don't trust it. And trust had been put at risk. The Snowden revelations put trust at risk."

He reiterated the company's pledge to build "transparency centres" around the world where customers who feel particularly at risk, such as those working in governments, can go to examine Microsoft's source code for themselves in order to see there are no spying back doors in place.