US Supreme Court Rules Geofence Warrants Require Constitutional Privacy Protections (theguardian.com) 47
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-3 (PDF) in Chatrie v United States (No. 25-112) that geofence warrants sweeping up smartphone location data constitute searches under the Fourth Amendment. The Court found that individuals have a "reasonable expectation of privacy" in such data, even when the tracking covers only a brief period or records movements in public. "An individual has a reasonable expectation of privacy in records about his cell phone's location, and police intrude on that constitutionally protected interest when they demand the information -- even though for only a limited time, and from a third-party tech company," wrote Justice Elena Kagan. Longtime Slashdot reader schwit1 submitted the story. The Guardian reports: The use of geofence warrants is widespread, and gives law enforcement agencies the power to compel tech companies to hand over sensitive cell phone data from people at or near crime scenes. The warrants allow police and the FBI to collect this information from individuals within the radius of a virtual "fence" during a particular timeframe. But they are not restricted to requesting data for precise targets.
The Chatrie case focuses on local police's pursuit of an armed bank robber in Richmond, Virginia. He fled with $195,000. Law enforcement tracked Okello Chatrie down through their use of geofence warrants. Chatrie had opted in to an optional Google "location history" feature that documented his location every few minutes. He was eventually sentenced to 12 years in prison, after pleading guilty. Chatrie's lawyers argued that this search was overly broad and violated his fourth amendment rights, which protects individuals from "unreasonable search and seizure." Lawyers said that police's use of geofence warrants amounted to an official "search" under the fourth amendment, and didn't meet the constitution's requirements for one.
The government had argued that accessing only a short amount of cellphone location information means this tactic does not count as a fourth amendment search and accordingly, should not be afforded the same privacy protections. But the judges in the majority disagreed. The judges in the majority opinion also wrote that the government's characterization of generating location history as a voluntary choice is "meritless." They suggested that people aren't choosing to share private information with third parties and the government "just by doing the ordinary thing cellphone users do." "The point of carrying smartphones is to use what is on them," including the apps and services they provide -- many of which use location data to customize a user's experience, they said.
[...] While the majority opinion noted that police conducted a fourth amendment search by accessing Chatrie's location history data, they noted that the court of appeals will weigh in on whether the "search was reasonable, meaning that each of its steps was properly described with particularity and found to be supported by probable cause." Law enforcement has said they need geofence warrants to find suspects and witnesses -- after reaching dead ends. The US government, for its part, has argued that people can't have a "reasonable expectation of privacy" when they are in public and have allowed a third party company, such as Google, to collect and analyze phone location data.
The Chatrie case focuses on local police's pursuit of an armed bank robber in Richmond, Virginia. He fled with $195,000. Law enforcement tracked Okello Chatrie down through their use of geofence warrants. Chatrie had opted in to an optional Google "location history" feature that documented his location every few minutes. He was eventually sentenced to 12 years in prison, after pleading guilty. Chatrie's lawyers argued that this search was overly broad and violated his fourth amendment rights, which protects individuals from "unreasonable search and seizure." Lawyers said that police's use of geofence warrants amounted to an official "search" under the fourth amendment, and didn't meet the constitution's requirements for one.
The government had argued that accessing only a short amount of cellphone location information means this tactic does not count as a fourth amendment search and accordingly, should not be afforded the same privacy protections. But the judges in the majority disagreed. The judges in the majority opinion also wrote that the government's characterization of generating location history as a voluntary choice is "meritless." They suggested that people aren't choosing to share private information with third parties and the government "just by doing the ordinary thing cellphone users do." "The point of carrying smartphones is to use what is on them," including the apps and services they provide -- many of which use location data to customize a user's experience, they said.
[...] While the majority opinion noted that police conducted a fourth amendment search by accessing Chatrie's location history data, they noted that the court of appeals will weigh in on whether the "search was reasonable, meaning that each of its steps was properly described with particularity and found to be supported by probable cause." Law enforcement has said they need geofence warrants to find suspects and witnesses -- after reaching dead ends. The US government, for its part, has argued that people can't have a "reasonable expectation of privacy" when they are in public and have allowed a third party company, such as Google, to collect and analyze phone location data.
alito barrett and thomas dissent (Score:5, Insightful)
if you agree with this decision then thank the liberals
Re:alito barrett and thomas dissent (Score:4, Insightful)
I love how in 2026 "liberals" means traditionalists with American values, and "conservatives" means people who see Stalin's police state as ideal. 20 years ago, would any of this had made sense?
Re:alito barrett and thomas dissent (Score:5, Insightful)
20 years ago, which was a few years after conservatives supported the Patriot Act which greatly increased govt surveillance of US citizens? Yeah, no real changes. The folks who want the police state now are the folks who have always wanted the police state (mostly through some idiotic idea that THE OTHER will be persecuted, but never themselves).
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To be fair, both sides have uniformly supported measures to increase the government's control over the citizenry. They tend to support different measures, with different arguments, but both do it. This is basically because people act to make their jobs easier. The differences are because they have (sometimes only slightly) different goals, or "centers of power".
Note that this applies to the Warren Court and the civil rights decisions as well as to the current more blatant authoritarianism.
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Scale matters though and one side does it way more and way worse than the other.
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I might well agree that the current administration is worse, and scale does, indeed, matter. But judging scale when one side is crippling state governments and the other side is removing individual rights isn't clear. The events are too different.
One can say that "morally the crippling of state governments to enfranchise the disenfranchised" is better, but it's still a centralization of control.
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The Republican Congress and administration is and has been doing worse historically on both those fronts.
Re:alito barrett and thomas dissent (Score:4, Informative)
Bernie Sanders has been against the Patriot Act since its inception.
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Bernie Sanders has been against the Patriot Act since its inception.
Oh yeah, that reminds me why I like Bern.
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"To be fair, both sides have uniformly supported measures to increase the government's control over the citizenry."
The difference is one side doesn't want political or legal oversight of those controls.
Judge: "Release these documents."
Lawyer: "Sure."
Months later...
Judge: "I said release these documents!"
Lawyer: "We are. We're just doing it slowly."
Months later...
Judge: "RELASE-THE-DOCUMENTS!"
Lawyer with headphones on playing a phone game: "Sorry your honor. My boss says I don't have to listen to you anymore
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20 years ago, which was a few years after conservatives supported the Patriot Act which greatly increased govt surveillance of US citizens? Yeah, no real changes. The folks who want the police state now are the folks who have always wanted the police state (mostly through some idiotic idea that THE OTHER will be persecuted, but never themselves).
The Democrats also voted overwhelmingly in favor of the PATRIOT ACT.
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20 years ago, which was a few years after conservatives supported the Patriot Act which greatly increased govt surveillance of US citizens? Yeah, no real changes. The folks who want the police state now are the folks who have always wanted the police state (mostly through some idiotic idea that THE OTHER will be persecuted, but never themselves).
The Democrats also voted overwhelmingly in favor of the PATRIOT ACT.
Typical. Modded down for making a simple, incontrovertible statement of fact.
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So if we're declaring "sides" to issues, which one was it that emplaced govt officials in social media companies to control what people were allowed to discuss?
Re:alito barrett and thomas dissent (Score:4, Interesting)
Neither party put government officials in social media companies, where are you getting that from?
Also, uhh, Elon Musk buying Twitter to specifically help elect Trump anyone?
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That... didn't happen. What you are probably thinking about is that during COVID, during both the Trump and Biden administrations (so your "sides" comment is laughable), there was a govt group which identified misinformation about COVID (yum yum gullible ivermectin!) and notified the social network owners. Those social network owners (YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, etc) added this data to their own internal checks, and decided to allow, deny, or demonitize based on their internal decisions. So the govt noti
Re:alito barrett and thomas dissent (Score:5, Insightful)
Let me be the Republican translator for you:
"Activist Judge" == "Judge who gives opinion I don't agree with"
Just like "Free and fair election" == "Election I win, otherwise it's rigged"
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To tack on about the 14th and how unambiguous it is we can look at the debate that was happening around it at the time to glean that out pretty easily because these topics were already brought up and the people who put it in the Constitution debated all these points already. The issues about unlawful immigrants and all that was discussed and the meaning to which it was voted on at the time is absolutely clear.
As far as I know, Mr. Secretary, you and I have no better title to the citizenship which we enjoy
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They people who wrote the 14th amendment and the Senate and states at the time it was amended meant what we all understand it means: If you are born on American soil you are a citizen. That's it, that's what it means and that's what they meant. This wasn't ancient Egypt, there are records of what people were talking about.
Re: alito barrett and thomas dissent (Score:2)
Which American values? There's not one set.
For example, this nation was founded on racism and theft. Are those the traditional values you mean?
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On this and the birthright citizenship ruling it is astounding that any of the justices would have dissented. This is clear-cut constitutional law. The fact that Roberts is willing to throw out a hundred years of precedent on several matters is deeply concerning. It really shows the constitution, the rule of law, the stability of precedent are all just recommendations, conveniences when they serve a political purpose. Otherwise they can be cast aside. Because, why not? It's so liberating to be free from
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Re:alito barrett and thomas dissent (Score:4, Insightful)
If you don't think the court is political in 2026 then you simply don't care about any of this and should stop commenting on it altogether.
If Trump wins in 2020 this probably goes the other way. If Hillary won in 2016 this is probably 7-2 or 8-1 or 9-0 instead of 6-3
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This has nothing to do with being liberal or not. Obviously 3 conservative judges were included in the majority. Not everything the SCOTUS decides falls along liberal/conservative tendencies of the judges.
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Even though I'm a liberal, I actually disagree with the court's decision in the birthright case. Just imagine a French couple go to Hawaii for vacation and she happens to have her baby early. Technically, that kid, when grown up, has to file taxes with the IRS annually and may even have to pay taxes while working in France. Worse yet, he may find that he's arrested when he comes to vacation to the U.S. because he's wanted by the IRS. I know it's a stretch, but that's no the only downside of the birthrig
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Come again? What does race have to do with it? In my example, I used a French couple. Even if the issue I raised was a niche issue, I still don't think their child born in the U.S. should automatically be a U.S. citizen. It just doesn't make sense. Same as those who are here illegally. If you have a problem with the current immigration laws in the U.S., fix THAT. Here's who I think should be a U.S. citizen by birth: a child born to a couple who at least
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Even though I'm a liberal, I actually disagree with the court's decision in the birthright case. Just imagine a French couple go to Hawaii for vacation and she happens to have her baby early. Technically, that kid, when grown up, has to file taxes with the IRS annually and may even have to pay taxes while working in France. Worse yet, he may find that he's arrested when he comes to vacation to the U.S. because he's wanted by the IRS. I know it's a stretch, but that's no the only downside of the birthright citizenship.
From what I've read, that baby is not a US citizen. There are long-established exceptions to birthright citizenship. The most obvious is a baby of a diplomat, since they are generally not "subject to the jurisdiction" of the United States. I believe that a baby born to parents on a temporary visa is also not granted birthright citizenship, since there is an explicit intention for the child to not be "subject to the jurisdiction" of the United States when they return home.
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if you agree with this decision then thank the liberals
No one can agree or disagree with this decision if they don't know the decision.
Anyone commenting on SCOTUS rulings without themselves reading the full text of the ruling, any additional concurring opinions, and all filed dissenting opinions, should not be listened to. They are no different than a dumb LLM outputting a repackaged salad of things they've heard others say, without actually encountering and understanding the tangible reality.
Your favorite blog can't be trusted to get it right.
Your favorite red
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-- Clarence Thomas
Re:Don't look! Don't look! (Score:5, Interesting)
Damn, I looked. Who else would be self important enough to continuously log their location? And then stupid enough to rob a bank?
Just because someone is stupid doesn't mean that they aren't subject to specific protections under law.
Ernesto Miranda, for whom the Miranda Warning is named, was by accounts a terrible person. Miranda's conviction was thrown out on those technical grounds that his confession should not have been permitted, then he was retried and convicted of the crime without his confession as evidence. Once he was released from prison he died in a bar fight.
The point of protections are that they apply to everyone, guilty or innocent, and are supposed to regulate the way that the legal system all the way from the patrolman to the attorney general behave. That doesn't mean that criminals aren't still criminals, but it does mean that the government has to provide proper justification for its actions against persons. If someone really did commit a crime then the government should be able to show cause, and this keeps everyone else from being scrutinized when the government has no business scrutinizing.
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People get tracked by their phones without being aware, or remembering, that they opted in as part of some other service that needs location. They don't feel "self-important" -- they're just using their phones, and are bewildered by all of the apps running on them.
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What a weird ... hey, wait, I think I figured it out!
You're looking at it from the point of view of the bank robber, aren't you? (Instead of from the point of view of all the people who didn't rob the bank but still somehow had their locations leaked to the government.)
Did I guess right?
Brett the Boofer concurred?? (Score:1)
color me surprised. Judge Napolitano had a lot to say back in the day about Kavanaugh's interpretation of the 4th Amendment
Automated license plate readers need to be next (Score:5, Insightful)
ALPR needs to be the next warrantless tracking case before the court. It is one thing for a private company to know which vehicles enter and exit their parking structure and something completely different for government to track a vehicle as it travels throughout the day.
Corporate sovereignty/Executive privilege . (Score:1)