For the right to personal privacy to survive in America in this digital age, courts must be meticulous in applying longstanding privacy protections to new technology. This did not happen in an unfortunate ruling last month by a three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit.
The case concerned a drug conviction based on information about the defendant’s location that the government acquired from a cellphone he carried on a three-day road trip in a motor home. The data, apparently obtained with a phone company’s help, led to a warrantless search of the motor home and the seizure of incriminating evidence.
The majority opinion held that there was no constitutional violation of the defendant’s rights because he “did not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in the data given off by his voluntarily procured pay-as-you-go cellphone.”
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Until recently,criminals have been under the impression that pay as you go cellphones were untraceable.The article states that the phone company helped.My question is if the phone company had a choice in whether to help or not.There is a huge difference between volunteering info and being court ordered to turn it over.Something tells me that if they had refused to cooperate with investigators serious consequences would have befallen them.
ReplyDeleteWhat privacy rights?
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ReplyDeleteStop Carring a Cell Phone. That's not hard to figure out.
Stop violating our rights at every possible chance. Thats not too hard to figure out, either. Going outside should NOT be an opportunity for the government to take your picture, follow your car, listen in on your calls, and search your house while you're gone --- all rubberstamped by the courts and perfectly ok. And ALL without a warrant. Read that again. We are under "surveillance" and are being "watched" on a far greater scale than any totalitarian regime has EVER done to it's citizens. The only difference? In Russia, Germany, China, etc, the government did it at the point of a gun. In the USA, it's done to the wild elation and cheering of the citizens themselves.
ReplyDeleteIf we can't be tracked,how on earth will the drones find us?
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