By Anna Salem, ACLU of Northern California at 2:57pm
In the digital age that we live in today, we are constantly exposing our personal information online. From using cell phones and GPS devices to online shopping and sending e-mail, the things we do and say online leave behind ever-growing trails of personal information. The ACLU believes that Americans shouldn’t have to choose between using new technology and keeping control of your private information. Each week, we feature some of the most interesting news related to technology and civil liberties that we’ve spotted from the previous week.
By Chris Calabrese, Legislative Counsel, ACLU Washington Legislative Office at 3:17pm
How is the Department of Justice using location tracking? If you were looking for an answer to this simple question, this was not the week. Instead, as Congress attempts to oversee this crucial privacy question, it is getting double talk and stonewalling.
Let’s start with the legal standard the Department is using. Earlier this week Senator Al Franken (D-MN) asked Attorney General Holder to clarify the Department’s position on location tracking. Specifically, he asked why, even though experts agree that the recent Supreme Court case US v. Jones stands for the proposition that law enforcement needs a warrant to place a GPS tracking device on a car, DOJ is arguing in another case for a lower, non-probable cause standard. (In an amicus, the ACLU argued that the Fourth Amendment requires that police obtain a warrant to engage in GPS monitoring.) The Attorney General replied that he wasn’t familiar with the case but agreed with Senator Franken that in interpreting Jones they were “likely to be dealing with a situation where we need a warrant.” This frustrating answer seems aimed at reassuring Congress that Americans’ constitutional rights are being protected while DOJ is arguing precisely the opposite in court.
By Anna Salem, ACLU of Northern California at 4:01pm
In the digital age that we live in today, we are constantly exposing our personal information online. From using cell phones and GPS devices to online shopping and sending e-mail, the things we do and say online leave behind ever-growing trails of personal information. The ACLU believes that Americans shouldn’t have to choose between using new technology and keeping control of your private information. Each week, we feature some of the most interesting news related to technology and civil liberties that we’ve spotted from the previous week.
By Catherine Crump, Staff Attorney, ACLU Speech, Privacy and Technology Project at 8:40am
Last night we filed an amicus brief in United States v. Pineda-Moreno, a Ninth Circuit case that could play a significant role in determining how broadly the Supreme Court’s recent GPS tracking decision, United States v. Jones, is applied to protect Americans’ privacy.
By Catherine Crump, Staff Attorney, ACLU Speech, Privacy and Technology Project at 3:04pm
Federal law enforcement has used people’s cell phones to track their movements for at least a decade, but even today there is no clear answer to whether the government needs a warrant to do so. Why? In part because the U.S. Justice Department appears to be pursuing a conscious strategy of trying to avoid a ruling on this question by a court of appeals.
By Catherine Crump, Staff Attorney, ACLU Speech, Privacy and Technology Project at 3:33pm
In a victory for the privacy rights of everyone with a cell phone, a court has held that law enforcement agents must get a warrant to access cell phone location records. The ACLU, ACLU of Texas and Electronic Frontier Foundation submitted a brief urging the court to adopt exactly this position. The Constitution requires nothing less.
By Jay Stanley, Senior Policy Analyst, ACLU Speech, Privacy and Technology Project at 3:52pm
The ACLU today wrote to the CEOs of the nation's major cell phone providers asking that they stop routinely collecting and storing data on their customers' daily movements.
By Catherine Crump, Staff Attorney, ACLU Speech, Privacy and Technology Project at 9:48am
Yesterday the Supreme Court heard argument in an important case that confronts how to apply Fourth Amendment's protections against unreasonable searches and seizures to new technologies.
Today the Supreme Court is hearing arguments in a case that’s likely to affect the privacy rights of anyone who carries a cell phone. The case, U.S. v. Jones, is about whether law enforcement needs a warrant before planting a GPS tracking device on a person’s car. But more and more, the government is monitoring people’s movements by tracking their cell phones.
It doesn’t matter whether your phone is a smartphone or not, or whether you use it to make calls — as long as your phone is turned on, it registers its location with cell phone networks several times a minute — and all U.S. cell phone companies hold on to that data.
The theme this week was "without": combating the spread of AIDS without actual tools and information to combat the spread of AIDS, searches without warrants, protections for business without protections for everybody else, government bureaucracy without privacy or security, accessing medical marijuana without federal government interference, sentencing without (or at least with a lot less) unfairness. That last one is good, the rest not so much....
