Security, Due Process and Convenience

teambpsi writes: "CNN is running an article about ISPs' concern over having law enforcement present during a court-ordered search. Since we are an ISP, I can understand the concern, however, also being a privacy freak, I think it adds a certain weight to the decision of wether to file the search in the first place. It adds a certain levity. I'm not sure what percentage of these search warrants are unnecessary, but I think that having due process in place is important. Opinions?"

Comments

Law Enforcement

[2names]

If the search is court ordered, it only makes sense that some law enforcement agency should be there to assist in carrying out the "warrant." However, the agency should only become directly involved if something illegal is found. They should maintain impartiality until some law has been found to have been broken, after all, in this country we are innocent until proven guilty, right?

Precautions

[Limburgher]

Time to encrypt everything. 512-bit encryption ought to slow them down, especially on large files.

"unreasonable" burden or not...

[quinto2000]

I tend to agree with the sentiment of the ruling judge in this case. Civillians shouldn't be given so much power over the conduct of a search. The police like to give them that power, because they aren't held to the same standards. When the number of searches increases, it's particularly important, however, that every search be held to a stricter scrutiny.

The police ability to hand off the search to a third party can easily be abused to circumvent fourth amendment protections. The boundary between an agent of the police and the police themselves can be fuzzy. This removes the question altogether.

do they really need warrants?

[JeanBaptiste]

Couldn't they obtain all the information they need through other means? Carnivore, echelon, and so on...

This is stupid

[NoBeardPete]

The defendant in the case subsequently sought to have that evidence suppressed, arguing that his Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable search and seizure was violated because it was conducted by civilians.

This is just stupid. If the ISP wants to cooperate with law enforcement, they could do so even without a search warrant. Once the search warrant has been drawn up, if the ISP wants to cooperate in the manner most convenient for them, and the law enforcement folks agree, there's no problem. I mean, given that the ISP is legally required to cough up the info, and given that they don't even really want to put up a fight about it, what does it matter whether or not some police officer is standing there scratching his ass while someone pulls up the data? It doesn't matter at all.

Things might be different if there was a legal concept of strong privacy between an ISP and its customers, as with Attorney-Client Privilege, confidential medical info, or communications between spouses. The fact is that there isn't, though.

Even if...

[GeneralEmergency]

..the POOOO LEEESE were a-waitin in the lobby, the challenge would still be valid. The search was still conducted by non-sworn personnel and such "evidence" should be suppressed. Maybe the ISP technician just typed the crap up?