3 ms·

This might run afoul of the Carpenter decision, right? It basically held that asking for cell tower location data is a search of the person rather than a subpoe

• ajross 7y ago
  Exactly, the warrant is exactly the mechanism used by our legal system to document the suspension of rights otherwise granted by the fourth amendment. And it's why I think a lot of the ire here is misdirected. I mean, sure, the police were wrong for asking for this data, but it's easy to see why they wanted it -- it makes their job easier in an obvious way. The real problem here is the judge that granted the warrant.
• throwaway17_17 7y ago
  Doubtful, Carpenter was based on the fact that the cell tower location was not a willing transfer of international, but merely a functioning of the cellular technology and so the information was still protected under the 4th amendment requirement for a warrant. In this case, suspect ‘willingly’ transferred that information to Google and there was a warrant request for the information. Although, I suspect that the warrant was more to make it easier to get Google’s compliance than to deal with 4th amendment concerns.