In Protections for Electronic Communications: the Stored Communications Act and the Fourth Amendment, Alexander Scolnik wrote:
As technology evolves, giving individuals new forms of communicating and government agents increasingly sophisticated tools for surveillance, courts have had to continually interpret the Fourth Amendment and define the extent of its reach in light of these new advances.
For the Fourth Amendment–the prohibition against unreasonable search and seizure–one of these foundational cases was Entick v. Carrington (1765). It was not until Katz in 1965 that the Supreme Court returned to the tradition of ex Parte Jackson and held that “the Fourth Amendment protects people, not places.”
It took nearly 50 years for Justice Brandeis’ ground-breaking law review article on the right to privacy to begin to widely influence judicial decisions. By 1948, though, a dozen or so states had begun to recognize the right as a part of common law.
Anuj C. Desai explains that the extension of the Fourth Amendment to cover postal mail, and then later to telephones, is based not so much on the inherently Constitutional nature of opening mail, but instead on the increasingly firm belief in the sanctity of the mail as expressed by Congress, legislators, and the public.
In the late 19th century, many began to see the rise of monopolistic telegraph operators as more of a threat than the government. Against this potential eavesdropper, the Bill of Rights provided no protection.
There have been four pivotal technologies that have forced modern American law and society to re-examine its notions of privacy and confidentiality.
There are currently no firm standards on the kinds of Fourth Amendment protections that should apply to cell phone tracking data. This is becoming an issue as GPS and other tracking technologies have been added to cell phone to satisfy E911 requirements, and as police agencies have discovered the potential benefits of mobile-phone location data.
Image via Wikipedia Domestic wiretaps have dropped by 14 percent from 2007 to 2008. FISA wiretaps are down as well, although the reasons are unclear. Pursuant to the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968, the Administrative Office … Continued
JURIST – Paper Chase: Canada judge rules emergency wiretap law unconstitutional: British Columbia Supreme Court Justice Barry Davies has ruled that Section 184.4 of the Canadian Criminal Code, which allows law enforcement officers to electronically intercept private communications in ‘exceptional … Continued
WSJ.com – High Court Says No to Wiretapping, Yes to Exclusionary Rule: Yesterday, the Supreme Court granted cert in a case that, commentators say, gives them an opporunity to carve out more exceptions to the “exclusionary rule,” a criminal procedure … Continued
Times Online – To bug or not to bug?: Fury and outrage – but not surprise – were the emotions expressed by most criminal lawyers this week to the disclosure in The Times that a solicitor’s conversation with his client, … Continued
WaPo – Bush Order Expands Network Monitoring: President Bush signed a directive this month that expands the intelligence community’s role in monitoring Internet traffic to protect against a rising number of attacks on federal agencies’ computer systems. Somehow, I am … Continued
Newsvine – FBI Wiretaps Dropped Due to Unpaid Bills: Telephone companies have cut off FBI wiretaps used to eavesdrop on suspected criminals because of the bureau’s repeated failures to pay phone bills on time. Do you feel safe yet? This … Continued
The Register: No email privacy rights under Constitution, US gov claims On October 8, 2007, the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit in Cincinnati granted the government’s request for a full-panel hearing in United States v. Warshak … Continued
American Civil Liberties Union – Hundreds of New Documents Reveal Expanded Military Role in Domestic Surveillance: New documents uncovered as a result of an American Civil Liberties Union and New York Civil Liberties Union lawsuit reveal that the Department of … Continued
Secrecy News – Implementing Domestic Intelligence Surveillance: Upon lawful request and for a thousand dollars, Comcast, one of the nation’s leading telecommunications companies, will intercept its customers’ communications under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The cost for performing any FISA … Continued
RSS Feed
Facebook
Twitter
Google+