# What Is an MLAT Request? Cross-Border Data | Kodex Source: https://www.kodexglobal.com/glossary/mlat-request > An MLAT request routes foreign evidence requests through government channels. Learn how MLATs work, why they are slow, and what alternatives exist. Legal Process ## MLAT Request An MLAT request is a formal request for evidence made by one country to another under a mutual legal assistance treaty. Rather than a foreign agency contacting a company directly, the request travels government to government and is executed using the receiving country’s own legal process. Also known as MLAT, mutual legal assistance treaty request The MLAT is the traditional answer to a hard problem: evidence sits in one country, the investigation is in another, and neither country’s courts have straightforward authority over the other’s territory. ### How the mechanism works A mutual legal assistance treaty is an agreement between two states to help each other gather evidence. The path a request takes: - An investigator in the requesting country prepares a request. - It goes to that country’s central authority, which reviews it for treaty compliance. - It is transmitted to the receiving country’s central authority, which in the United States is the Department of Justice Office of International Affairs. - That authority reviews it and refers it to a domestic prosecutor. - The prosecutor obtains domestic legal process (a subpoena, order, or warrant) and serves it on the company. The company is served under its own country’s law, by its own country’s authorities. The foreign origin is largely invisible at the point of service. ### Why the speed problem matters MLAT requestDirect legal process Who serves the company Domestic authority Domestic authority Typical elapsed time Many months Days to weeks Foreign authority contacts company directly No N/A Legal standard applied Receiving country’s Receiving country’s The delay is not merely inconvenient. It is the structural pressure behind everything that has been built to route around MLATs, and it is also why fraudulent requests that promise to bypass process find willing audiences. An investigator who has been told an MLAT will take ten months is highly motivated to find another way. ### What it means for a company receiving one The most valuable thing to know is the negative case. A properly executed MLAT does not arrive as a letter from a foreign police force. It arrives as domestic legal process. A document that presents itself as an MLAT request while coming directly from a foreign agency is either a misunderstanding of the mechanism or a fraudulent request, and either way it should not be actioned as compulsory process. Where a genuine MLAT-derived instrument arrives, it is handled like any other domestic process of that type: validate it, scope it, and produce to the scope. ### What is changing The CLOUD Act enabled bilateral executive agreements that let qualifying foreign governments serve orders on US providers directly, subject to human rights and oversight conditions. The EU’s e-Evidence Regulation creates a comparable intra-EU mechanism with defined response deadlines. Both are attempts to keep lawful access workable at internet speed without abandoning the safeguards that made MLATs slow in the first place. FAQ ### Frequently asked questions Why are MLAT requests so slow? Because they pass through at least four hands: the foreign investigator, that country’s central authority, the receiving country’s central authority, and finally a domestic prosecutor who must obtain local legal process. Each stage involves review and translation. Ten months is a commonly cited average, and complex requests take considerably longer. Does a company receive an MLAT request directly? No, and that is a useful verification signal. If an MLAT has been executed properly, what arrives at the company is ordinary domestic legal process: a subpoena, order, or warrant issued by a local court. A document arriving directly from a foreign agency claiming MLAT authority is not how the mechanism works. What is replacing MLATs? Bilateral CLOUD Act agreements and, in the European Union, the e-Evidence Regulation both create faster channels that let qualifying foreign authorities reach providers more directly, under defined safeguards. Neither eliminates MLATs, which remain the fallback where no such arrangement exists. Glossary ### Related terms #### CLOUD Act The CLOUD Act establishes that US providers must produce data they control regardless of where it is stored, and creates a framework for bilateral agreements letting qualifying foreign governments serve orders on US providers directly. It also gives providers a route to challenge orders that conflict with foreign law. #### European Production Order (EU e-Evidence) A European Production Order lets a judicial authority in one EU member state require a service provider in another to hand over electronic evidence directly, without routing through the second state’s government. Introduced by the EU e-Evidence Regulation, it carries short deadlines: generally ten days, or eight hours in an emergency. #### Court Order A court order is any directive issued by a judge that compels a party to act. In data request work the term usually refers to an order compelling disclosure of records, but it also covers non-disclosure orders and preservation directives, so the label alone does not tell you what an order requires. Cross-border process is changing fast. See Kodex’s guidance on EU e-Evidence. Learn more