By Daniel J. Solove The U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit just issued a 97-page ruling limiting the NSA’s power to sweep up data about people’s phone calls. The case is ACLU v. Clapper, and the court held that the USA Patriot Act Section 215 doesn’t authorize the kind of sweeping collection of […]
Category: Surveillance
Posts about Surveillance by Professor Daniel J. Solove for his blog at TeachPrivacy, a privacy awareness and security training company.
Surveillance Law in Dire Need of Reform: The Promise of the LEADS Act
By Daniel J. Solove The law regulating government surveillance and information gathering is in dire need of reform. This law, which consists of the Fourth Amendment and several statutes, was created largely in the 1970s and 1980s and has become woefully outdated. The result is that law enforcement officials and intelligence agencies can readily find […]
People Care About Privacy Despite Their Behavior
It is often said that people don’t care much about privacy these days given how much information they expose about themselves. But survey after survey emphatically concludes that people really do care about privacy.
The Potentially Profound Implications of United States v. Jones
I must respectfully disagree with a recent post by Renee Hutchins on our blog [link no longer available] about the recent U.S. Supreme Court case, United States v. Jones. She concludes:
Two New Cases Regarding NSA Surveillance
The 9th Circuit has decided a pair of cases involving the NSA Surveillance Program. In Jewel v. NSA, the 9th Circuit concluded that plaintiffs had standing to raise constitutional challenges against NSA telephone surveillance:
FTC v. Santa
Jeff Jarvis has this humorous piece about the FTC vs. Santa:
United States v. Jones and GPS Surveillance
The Supreme Court has long held that there is no expectation of privacy in public for the purposes of the Fourth Amendment. Because the Fourth Amendment turns on the existence of a reasonable expectation of privacy, the Court’s logic means that the Fourth Amendment provides no protection to surveillance in public. In United States v. Jones, the […]
GPS Surveillance and the Fourth Amendment: Thoughts on United States v. Jones
In United States v. Jones, FBI agents installed a GPS tracking device on Jones’ car and monitored where he drove for a month without a warrant. Jones challenged the warrantless GPS surveillance as a violation of the Fourth Amendment. The D.C. Circuit agreed with Jones.
More Fun with the Airline Screening Playset: Body Imaging X-Ray Edition!
I’ve been following the recent controversy over the TSA’s body imaging X-ray machines, otherwise known as the “backscatter” or “exhibit-yourself-in-the-nude” devices. It made me reminisce about an old post I wrote about the Playmobil airline screening playset. I had not used the playset for a while. Five long years have elapsed since my post, and […]
Cell Phone Stalking
According to the Wall St. Journal, “more than 25,000 adults in the U.S. are victims of GPS stalking annually, including by cellphone.” The article notes that a cell phone account holder can track everyone on the account. Users are notified by text message but can’t stop it. This tracking policy might work well with a […]