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Radio News: Warrantless location surveillance is constitutional, court says
Apr 14, 2016 10:47 pm
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The Guardian reports that the sixth circuit court of appeals ruled April 12 that warrantless collection of cellphone location records is constitutional in the United States. The American Civil Liberties Union said in a brief that the location tracking in the case revealed the “extraordinary private details” police obtain through location tracking, down to where the defendants may worship and who they may be sleeping with. But the court said that the defendant's carrying a cell phone around gave them “no expectation of privacy” for location information, emphasizing that the records, “say nothing about the content of any calls.” The ACLU reported that the phone records included nearly 13,000 separate location points for one defendant, and more than 23,000 for the other, for an average of one every six minutes. Defense lawyers have not said if they will appeal the case to the Supreme Court. Read the full story in The Guardian.
The Guardian reports that the sixth circuit court of appeals ruled April 12 that warrantless collection of cellphone location records is constitutional in the United States. The American Civil Liberties Union said in a brief that the location tracking in the case revealed the “extraordinary private details” police obtain through location tracking, down to where the defendants may worship and who they may be sleeping with. But the court said that the defendant's carrying a cell phone around gave them “no expectation of privacy” for location information, emphasizing that the records, “say nothing about the content of any calls.” The ACLU reported that the phone records included nearly 13,000 separate location points for one defendant, and more than 23,000 for the other, for an average of one every six minutes. Defense lawyers have not said if they will appeal the case to the Supreme Court. Read the full story in The Guardian.