6 ms·

Would not the location tracking telling them the girls phone was inside the house be probable cause? Seems more reliable than a dog alerting on a car.

cmiles74 11y ago
Whoever said that the phone location tracking was anywhere near this level of reliable? IMHO, it's really only good as a sort of hint on where your phone _might_ be.
- anikamariam 11y ago
  do you think the police care?
- phil21 11y ago
  Which is more reliable than other pieces of evidence that meet the probable cause bar. Such as a police dog alerting. Certainly seems to meet the (pathetically low) threshold to me at least.
- such_a_casual 11y ago
  You must have missed the article where a judge ruled the police are not responsible for making sure technology is reliable, even drug tests: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10814544 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10814544 (Police plan and execute a SWAT raid based on a bogus field test of tea leaves. Judge ruled the police are not responsible for knowing that the tests are completely inaccurate.)
- harryh 11y ago
  "might be" absolutely constitutes probable cause.
  - sp00ls 11y ago
    I don't know. Out of curiosity I just tried Find my iPhone on my own device which has been sitting in the same location in my house for about an hour completely untouched. Apple's interface shows my iPhone about a half mile away in a house I've never visited or been in before. There is a big circle around my device (which doesn't even include the actual location) but the actual dot is somewhere I've never been before. I've refreshed it about 5 times now 2-3 minutes apart and it is absolutely convinced that I am at that location. I avoided touching my iPhone during this experiment to mimic a real life scenario where the phone is out of reach. If I were in a scenario where I believed a family member was taken against their will to a location I would absolutely want a search, but this experiment makes it pretty clear why Find my iPhone is not probable cause to me.. Still trying to figure out why multiple 'pinpoint location' requests are showing somewhere about a half mile away from my real location. I would think that that type of request would push something to the phone which would power up GPS for accuracy, but it doesn't appear to be so.
    - briandear 11y ago
      Was the phone within the tinted radius? The dot doesn't represent your location; it represents the center of a circle containing your phone.
      - sp00ls 11y ago
        No, it wasn't.
    - harryh 11y ago
      I am impressed that you were able to draw such a broad conclusion from a single experiment!
- rayiner 11y ago
  That's probably not a fair description of the accuracy of the technology. Out of a random sample of 100 locations, how often would the technology yield the right house? I bet it's over 50%, which is definitely sufficient for probable cause.
- superuser2 11y ago
  You don't need a certain conviction for a search warrant, you need probable cause.

cmiles74 11y ago

Whoever said that the phone location tracking was anywhere near this level of reliable? IMHO, it's really only good as a sort of hint on where your phone _might_ be.

anikamariam 11y ago
do you think the police care?
phil21 11y ago
Which is more reliable than other pieces of evidence that meet the probable cause bar. Such as a police dog alerting. Certainly seems to meet the (pathetically low) threshold to me at least.
such_a_casual 11y ago
You must have missed the article where a judge ruled the police are not responsible for making sure technology is reliable, even drug tests: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10814544 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10814544 (Police plan and execute a SWAT raid based on a bogus field test of tea leaves. Judge ruled the police are not responsible for knowing that the tests are completely inaccurate.)
harryh 11y ago
"might be" absolutely constitutes probable cause.
- sp00ls 11y ago
  I don't know. Out of curiosity I just tried Find my iPhone on my own device which has been sitting in the same location in my house for about an hour completely untouched. Apple's interface shows my iPhone about a half mile away in a house I've never visited or been in before. There is a big circle around my device (which doesn't even include the actual location) but the actual dot is somewhere I've never been before. I've refreshed it about 5 times now 2-3 minutes apart and it is absolutely convinced that I am at that location. I avoided touching my iPhone during this experiment to mimic a real life scenario where the phone is out of reach. If I were in a scenario where I believed a family member was taken against their will to a location I would absolutely want a search, but this experiment makes it pretty clear why Find my iPhone is not probable cause to me.. Still trying to figure out why multiple 'pinpoint location' requests are showing somewhere about a half mile away from my real location. I would think that that type of request would push something to the phone which would power up GPS for accuracy, but it doesn't appear to be so.
  - briandear 11y ago
    Was the phone within the tinted radius? The dot doesn't represent your location; it represents the center of a circle containing your phone.
    - sp00ls 11y ago
      No, it wasn't.
  - harryh 11y ago
    I am impressed that you were able to draw such a broad conclusion from a single experiment!
rayiner 11y ago
That's probably not a fair description of the accuracy of the technology. Out of a random sample of 100 locations, how often would the technology yield the right house? I bet it's over 50%, which is definitely sufficient for probable cause.
superuser2 11y ago
You don't need a certain conviction for a search warrant, you need probable cause.