Cellphone tower data protected by US Constitution A federal judge has ruled that subscriber data captured from cellphone towers is protected by the US Constitution's Fourth Amendment guarantee against illegal searches and seizures. The decision is part of a sea change from half a decade worth of previous rulings, in which police weren't required to obtain search warrants based …
"... investigators who said there was no reasonable expectation such data is private."
I'd wager most have no expectation that such data exists which puts it with the covert GPS tracking devices or bugs of various types which definitely require a warrant. Where did law enforcement get the belief that any of this would be ok as long as nobody found out about it?
> "Where did law enforcement get the belief that any of this would be ok as long as nobody found out about it?"
200+ years of precedent.
The great thing about the Most Holy US Constitution is that it completely replaces sadly outdated concepts like a sense of fair play, basic decency or common sense. Anything that you're not explicitly stopped from doing must implicitly be fine.
And even if you are prohibited by one set of filthy liberal / fascist conservative politically appointees, just wait for the regime to change and a few of them to die off, then try your luck with the new creatures. It's the game that never ends.
This is good news.
A cell base communications links contains far more customer data than do telephone switches/exchanges which require search warrants.
US police have, for years, been sticking recording GPS receivers on their clients cars for years without seeking court approval.Now they will either have to get approval or follow suspects in the old fashioned way.
Still not ruled on are the use of miniature spy planes.
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