Microsoft leaker sentenced to three months in jail

A former Microsoft employee charged with passing trade secrets to a French blogger has been sentenced to three months in jail, after pleading guilty to stealing the company's confidential product details.

Russian national Alex Kibkalo spent seven years with Microsoft as a software architect in Lebanon and Russia before he was arrested by the US FBI in March for handing over stolen pre-release Windows 8 RT and Activation Server Software Development Kit product details to a technology blogger in France.

The blogger then posted the information online and sold Windows Server activation keys on eBay.

Kibkalo has previously admitted to stealing and leaking the confidential information, with prosecutors at the time recommending a three-month prison sentence and $22,500 payment to Microsoft.

Along with the prison sentence handed down earlier this week - a term which he is nearing the end of given he has been in custody since his March arrest - Kibkalo was waived a $100 fine due to an inability to pay it.

Microsoft had pinpointed the source of the leak after examining the content of the blogger's Hotmail account, which it said it was allowed to do as part of its terms of service in "exceptional circumstances".

Following criticism from privacy advocates it later changed its policy to say it would call in law enforcement to inspect a customer's content in future circumstances.