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Supreme Court: Warrant Generally Needed To Track Cell Phone Location Data (cnn.com)
daveschroeder writes: The Supreme Court on Friday said the government generally needs a warrant if it wants to track an individual's location through cell phone records over an extended period of time. The ruling [PDF] is a major victory for advocates of increased privacy rights who argued more protections were needed when it comes to the government obtaining information from a third party such as a cell phone company. The 5-4 opinion was written by Chief Justice John Roberts siding with the four most liberal justices. It is a loss for the Justice Department, which had argued that an individual has diminished privacy rights when it comes to information that has been voluntarily shared with someone else.
A few years ago I had been drafted into jury duty for the 9th circuit in California. The case involved some sort of Medicare scam involving bogus sales of medical "devices" such as mobility scooters. During the jury selection process, prosecutors asked the pool whether any prospective jurors took issue with warrantless location tracking via cell phone towers. Apparently I was the only person who took issue with this, because the other 71 people in the room did not raise their hands. My public conversation with the court went something like this:
Prosecutor: Why do you take exception to warrantless location tracking?
Me: I believe the 3rd party doctrine is being abused in a manner that is unconstitutional and therefore illegal
Judge: I will decide what is legal and illegal, and your job is to decide innocence or guilt
Me: Richard Nixon once declared that "if the President does it, it's not illegal". We all know how that turned out. I will decide for myself whether the spirit of the Constitution is being violated
Jurors were then adjourned while the judge, prosecutor, and defense attorney negotiated a jury pool. The pool was then welcomed back into the room, and I was thanked for my service, but then dismissed.
It's nice to see the Supreme Court finally came to the same conclusion.