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Appeals Court Rolls Back Computer Privacy Guidelines

Posted by Soulskill on from the let's-shoot-from-the-hip-instead dept.

Last year we discussed news of a court ruling that established a set of guidelines for how investigators can enact search warrants involving electronically stored data. Essentially, it required authorities to specify the data for which they were searching, and to take precautions to avoid the collection of unrelated data, whether it was incriminating or not. Now, a federal appeals court has thrown out those guidelines despite agreeing with the conclusion that investigators must only collect data specified in a warrant. Instead, the ruling (PDF) leaves us with a plea for "greater vigilance on the part of judicial officers in striking the right balance between the government’s interest in law enforcement and the right of individuals to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures."

5 of 88 comments (clear)

  1. I'm going to go with... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    WHAT. THE. FUCK?

    I know a lot of officers in various branches (police, *BI, sheriff, etc.) and count several as close friends.. but I wouldn't trust a single one of them to not go beyond the mandate of the warrant without something official binding them. The egos of most officers I have met have all been "I _am_ the law" style of bullshit that leads to people being hanged before their guilt has been proven and then "Whoops, we made a mistake. Oh well. I'm sure s/he was guilty of something." Meanwhile, the innocent person has been vilified in the news and can't do business where they live anymore.

    We either need strict rules that our police officers have to follow, or we need psych evaluations to weed out the overzealous people who go too far, too fast, without consideration that someone is innocent until PROVEN guilty.

  2. Re:fp? by berashith · · Score: 4, Interesting

    agreed. There was a reason that the original rules were so strict. The founders could have requested that the powerful should just be nice in their handling of the masses, but they instead chose to be explicit. Sorry to the coppers if that gives them a little extra work, but it is nice to avoid a witchhunt.

  3. Well... we're boned. by AltairDusk · · Score: 4, Informative

    Nice to know our latest appointee to the Supreme Court is looking out for our privacy rights.

    From TFA:

    Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan, as solicitor general last year, had urged the court to reverse itself amid complaints that federal prosecutions were being complicated, and computer searches were grinding to a halt, because of the detailed guidelines.

  4. Re:Not sure what the big deal is by captainpanic · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I don't have anything on my computer but music, email and movies. I don't break the law. I am a average citizen in this respect, and I have nothing to hide. Let them look at my computer if they like.

    I don't have any weapons or drugs in my house, I still don't want a police officer to come in unasked and search the place, or look through my windows to what I have inside, or what I am doing. My computer, and the data on it, are just as much in my house as the stuff in my drawers and closets.

    And anyway, I wouldn't be so sure that you don't break the law. The fact that you don't know that you break the law does not mean you don't actually break it.

  5. Re:Not sure what the big deal is by jefe7777 · · Score: 5, Insightful
    Parent post almost sounds like sarcasm. But if it's serious, here are a few points you might consider:

    .

    Do you really know the laws? There are thousands on the books, and thousands created each year.

    Do you really know what's on your computer? If you're the average citizen, then there's a high probability that your computer has been or will be compromised at some point. "Hello Mr. Smith, we have some bad news for you. After forensic examination of your hard drive, we found evidence of money laundering, child pornography, and several thousand instances of copyright violation. But don't worry. We're going to make you an offer you can't refuse.

    And you would not be able to rely on the common sense of law enforcement and the criminal justice system. You see, this is an adversarial process. It's not "Innocent to proven guilty". Law enforcement is tasked with making convictions, among other things. Numbers count. There's also this other little problem, the one of "low hanging fruit", ever heard of it? It's a reference to the fact that people tend to do as little as possible, and when that expresses itself in agents of the state, e.g. law enforcement, what you end up with is the majority of their efforts are expended on two bit criminals, and unlucky stupid people that are of no real threat to any one.

    Here in the U.S., if I'm not mistaken, we're at the top of the list for the number of people imprisoned as a percentage of population. This leads me to believe that we incarcerate people for a lot of petty bullshit, especially the poor.

    Here we go: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_incarceration_rate