The Government Can No Longer Track Your Cell Phone Without a Warrant 173
Jason Koebler (3528235) writes The government cannot use cell phone location data as evidence in a criminal proceeding without first obtaining a warrant, an appeals court ruled today, in one of the most important privacy decisions in recent memory. "In short, we hold that cell site location information is within the subscriber's reasonable expectation of privacy," the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit ruled. "The obtaining of that data without a warrant is a Fourth Amendment violation."
The US Government can overrule anything (Score:5, Insightful)
Just because an appeal court judge rules that the government can not do something it doesn't mean that the government will oblige to that ruling
The Obama administration is no longer bound by any law, nor the Constitution of the United States - they can overstep anything and overrule anything
They can lie to the congress and get away with it
They can set terrorists free without having to consult the congress, or the courts
The Obama administration does not care about any judge / court / law, because to them, they are ABOVE IT ALL !
Re:FP? (Score:4, Insightful)
It's a misleading title.
It should say: "The government is expected to no longer track your cell phone without a warrant, by very naive people."
Re:The US Government can overrule anything (Score:5, Insightful)
You keep saying Obama administration. It's not one president's or even one person's doing. It's a collective effort of many people across many administrations and congresses.
Re:FP? (Score:5, Insightful)
So they can't use the tracking data as evidence, but if they use the tracking data to find it where you are, and then sent out some agents to see what you were up to, and found other incriminating evidence, they could present that evidence in court. They could always just say they happened to be in the area. Just the data of you being somewhere probably wouldn't be compelling evidence on it's own anyway, so there probably isn't much of a need to present your cell phone location as evidence if they have real evidence anyway.
Re:FP? (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, it means they'll need to do more "parallel" construction to hide the actual source of this, and further undermine the concept of the justice system where you get to see the evidence against you.
They will just have to be more creative in how they go about these things, so that nobody knows they're doing the illegal stuff.
Correction (Score:4, Insightful)
"The Government Can No Longer Track Your Cell Phone Without a Warrant"
The headline is slightly inaccurate. It should read:
"The Government Can No Longer Legally Track Your Cell Phone Without a Warrant"
But since history demonstrates conclusively that the government couldn't care less about staying within the law, that makes very little difference. It most certainly can track your cell phone without a warrant, it most probably does so, and you would be most unwise to assume it isn't doing so.
Re:not in TFA but still very relevant (Score:3, Insightful)
Seven different armed robberies justifies the length of the sentence. That's seven separate violent acts, seven chances for some innocent working stiff to get shot over a lousy $100, if not less than that.
Just how many times do you think a person should get to stick a firearm in someone's face before they go away forever?
Re:The US Government can overrule anything (Score:4, Insightful)
You keep saying Obama administration. It's not one president's or even one person's doing. It's a collective effort of many people across many administrations and congresses.
While you're technically right, it would only take 1 sitting president to stop it.
Coincidentally, we currently only have 1 sitting president.
So, when is he going to stop it?
Re:FP? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:FP? (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:FP? (Score:5, Insightful)
Which they only gathered initially after using the stuff without probable cause or legal means.
Parellel construction is the fruit of the poisonous tree, because the starting point of the investigation begins with "we have this, we're not legally allowed to have it, but what can we dig up to make it look like we got this legally?".
As far as I'm concerned, it's essentially a legal strategy to allow perjury.
If they had legally obtained information based on probable cause, there would be no issue. What they end up with is something else.
Re:Jurisdiction (Score:3, Insightful)
You're not splitting hairs; these things matter to the courts. The terms you're looking for here are:
* Precedent -- an older court decision that can be cited for similar logic or analogy (doesn't mean courts have to follow it)
* Binding - a decision the court must follow
* Persuasive - a decision the court can follow
* Distinguish - finding a conceptual difference between the case at hand, and an older precedent. Possibly the judges want to write new law, or possibly they just don't want to follow binding precedent.
The courts, particularly at the federal appeals level always provide a "new decision", even if it's marked as "unpublished". If the courts render a decision they are required to render that decision "on the record". Trust you me, however, if appeals courts see it differently than another circuit they say so and decide differently. There are even frequent ping-pong matches between the supreme court and circuit courts. SCOTUS says Y is wrong, do X. The appeals court says we just found out about J, so we're still doing Y. And the cycle begins anew. Occasionally, circut courts go so far as to say "no thank you" to a supreme court decision.
On the other hand, judges also worry about peer opinion, like the rest of us. Typically, they don't enjoy being overruled. So as points of law become more settled it's unlikely they deviate. Adding to the confusion, sometimes SCOTUS/the circuit courts make decisions and realize they are just unworkable in practice. Then without "overruling" they adjust the standards/factors courts look to when deciding if something is allowed/disallowed.
Truth is, this will take 20-30 years to see where it settles. The judicial perception of time is vastly different than our perception of time.
Re:Legal question (Score:4, Insightful)
The norm.
How many police departments have had to remind their officers that they do not have the legal authority to delete images off your cell phone, or that filming them isn't illegal?
Increasingly, police believe the law is whatever they say it means. And they will abuse the law to make sure that's the case.
Because, when you tell them they aren't allowed to delete the images off your phone and you protest, they will slap you with resisting arrest -- despite the fact that you weren't being arrested, nor were you breaking the law, they were.