The author is confused about the technology. The government didn't intercept GPS signals from the phone because that's not possible. Only the GPS satellites tra

The author is confused about the technology. The government didn't intercept GPS signals from the phone because that's not possible. Only the GPS satellites transmit signals, and the devices merely receive them. But the phone was transmitting its GPS coordinates to the phone company, who then passed this on to the government. From page 4 of the opinion: “Believing that Big Foot was carrying the 6447 phone, authorities obtained an order from a federal magistrate judge on July 12, 2006, authorizing the phone company to release subscriber information, cell site information, GPS real-time location, and ‘ping’ data for the 6447 phone in order to learn Big Foot's location while he was en route to deliver the drugs.”