Location Tracking

05/18/2012

DEA Recording Americans’ Movements on Highways, Creating Central Repository of Plate Data

By Jay Stanley, Senior Policy Analyst, ACLU Speech, Privacy and Technology Project at 3:58pm

The DEA wants to capture the license plates of all vehicles traveling along Interstate 15 in Utah, and store that data for two years at their facility in Northern Virginia. And, as a DEA official told Utah legislators at a hearing this week (attended by ACLU of Utah staff and covered in local media), these scanners are already in place on “drug trafficking corridors” in California and Texas and are being considered for Arizona as well. The agency is also collecting plate data from unspecified other sources and sharing it with over ten thousand law enforcement agencies around the nation.

05/17/2012

GPS Act

In Congress Today: Testifying in Support of Geo-Privacy

By Catherine Crump, Staff Attorney, ACLU Speech, Privacy and Technology Project at 5:23pm

Today I testified before the House Judiciary Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security Subcommittee in support of the Geolocational Privacy Surveillance Act, a law that would require law enforcement to obtain a warrant based upon probable cause before tracking a person by (for example) attaching a GPS device to their car or getting records from their cell phone provider. (My written testimony is here).

05/15/2012

License Plate Scanners

In Massachusetts, A Registry of Everywhere You’ve Ever Driven?

By Kade Crockford, Director, ACLU of Massachusetts Technology for Liberty Project at 1:46pm

Back in the fall of 2010, I was perusing the Massachusetts state public safety website when I came upon an interesting notice. The state had received nearly a half a million dollars from the federal Department of Transportation for the purchase and distribution of automatic license plate recognition (ALPR) systems for state and local police. And there was one detail there that really surprised me.

05/14/2012

On the Agenda

On the Agenda: Week of May 14–18, 2012

By Suzanne Ito, ACLU at 12:39pm

This week the House will debate the NDAA for fiscal year 2013. We'll be monitoring the debate and pulling for an amendment that fixes the terrible detention provisions in last year's bill.

05/10/2012

Location Tracking

DOJ Cell Phone Tracking: Excellent questions, Senator

By Chris Calabrese, Legislative Counsel, ACLU Washington Legislative Office at 4:51pm

Sen. Al Franken (D- MN) is trying to get some answers to straightforward questions about cell-phone location tracking. Today, using our recent nationwide FOIA as a jumping off point, he sent a letter to the Department of Justice asking them to provide basic information about a practice that, in the words of Justice Sonia Sotomayor, “generates a precise, comprehensive record of a person’s public movements that reflects a wealth of detail about her familial, political, professional, religious, and sexual associations.”

05/10/2012

Checkpoint Society

A Creeping Private-Sector “Checkpoint Society”—and a Small Step to Protect Your Privacy

By Jay Stanley, Senior Policy Analyst, ACLU Speech, Privacy and Technology Project at 4:03pm

I was at a Target store recently and threw a bottle of wine in my cart to bring as a gift to a party. Later, when I got to the register, the cashier asked to see my ID. That in itself was silly, because it’s safe to say I’m a few years past the point where anyone might mistake me for someone under 21. But whatever; alcohol age-enforcement has gotten bureaucratic beyond all reason.

I held the ID up for her to see. Before I could react, she took my license from my fingers, held it up to a scanner, and BEEP!

05/04/2012

Government Surveillance

Saturday Panel in NYC: Life in the Panopticon

By Jay Stanley, Senior Policy Analyst, ACLU Speech, Privacy and Technology Project at 4:53pm

A quick note to our New York City-area readers: the ACLU's Catherine Crump, author Ken MacLeod, Cato's Julian Sanchez and others will be appearing at Cooper Union this Saturday for a panel on "Life in the Panopticon: Thoughts on Freedom in an Era of Pervasive Surveillance.” The panel is sponsored by the ACLU and Cooper Union as part of the PEN American Center’s Festival of International Literature.

05/02/2012

Domestic Drones

Drones: The Nightmare Scenario

By Jay Stanley, Senior Policy Analyst, ACLU Speech, Privacy and Technology Project at 12:05pm

In our drones report, we discuss the coming onslaught of domestic drones and the weak state of the privacy laws that should protect us, and we outline our recommendations for protections that Congress and local governments should put in place.

But if nothing is done, how might things go? Let’s take a look at how police drone use could unfold:

04/27/2012

dotRights

Civil Liberties in the Digital Age: Weekly Highlights (4/27/2012)

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.

House Passes Controversial Cybersecurity Measure CISPA [Wired]
"The House on Thursday approved cybersecurity legislation that privacy groups have decried as a threat to civil liberties… Its goal is a more secure internet, but privacy groups fear the measure breaches Americans' privacy along the way."
     See Also Keep Domestic Cybersecurity Efforts in Civilian Hands [ACLU]
     See Also Insanity: CISPA Just Got Way Worse, And Then Passed On Rushed Vote [Techdirt]
     See Also The CISPA Amendments We Really Need [Read Write Web]
     See Also White House Threatens Veto, ACLU Says CISPA Amendments Not Enough [Reason]

04/27/2012

Location Tracking

Need For a Warrant For GPS Tracking Still Not Settled

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.

American Civil Liberties Union