US Supreme Court approves search warrants for computers in any jurisdiction
The U.S. Supreme Court has authorized a rule change that -- barring intervention by Congress -- will allow judges to issue search warrants for computers in any jurisdiction, instead of just the ones their courts oversee directly.
The new rules were sent to Congress by Chief Justice John Roberts, giving them a chance to be modified or rejected, Reuters said on Friday. If Congress doesn't take action by Dec. 1, the change will take effect automatically.
Opposition is already promised by Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR), who said he will introduce legislation to undo the change. Wyden argued that it could allow the government to use a single warrant to search "thousands or millions" of computers at a time, most of which would "belong to the victims, not the perpetrators, of a cybercrime."
The U.S. Justice Department has been pushing for expanded reach in this area since 2013, its own position being that it's a minor change needed to modernize the law and pursue criminals who anonymize their identity -- something potentially easier to counter with remote searches.
Other factions on the same side as Wyden include Google, and civil liberties groups like Access Now and the American Civil Liberties Union. Google servers could easily be a target for the new search warrants, given the popularity of Android and services like Gmail.
The Justice Department has also been seeking the ability to compel companies like Apple and Google into circumventing encryption, though its efforts have largely failed so far. A proposed bill might salvage that goal.
Search powers appear set to be curtailed in another way through the Email Privacy Act, which should force federal agencies to obtain a warrant for email older than 180 days.
The new rules were sent to Congress by Chief Justice John Roberts, giving them a chance to be modified or rejected, Reuters said on Friday. If Congress doesn't take action by Dec. 1, the change will take effect automatically.
Opposition is already promised by Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR), who said he will introduce legislation to undo the change. Wyden argued that it could allow the government to use a single warrant to search "thousands or millions" of computers at a time, most of which would "belong to the victims, not the perpetrators, of a cybercrime."
The U.S. Justice Department has been pushing for expanded reach in this area since 2013, its own position being that it's a minor change needed to modernize the law and pursue criminals who anonymize their identity -- something potentially easier to counter with remote searches.
Other factions on the same side as Wyden include Google, and civil liberties groups like Access Now and the American Civil Liberties Union. Google servers could easily be a target for the new search warrants, given the popularity of Android and services like Gmail.
The Justice Department has also been seeking the ability to compel companies like Apple and Google into circumventing encryption, though its efforts have largely failed so far. A proposed bill might salvage that goal.
Search powers appear set to be curtailed in another way through the Email Privacy Act, which should force federal agencies to obtain a warrant for email older than 180 days.
Comments
Wow the supreme court is now making rules, talking about legislating from the bench. This shows you how out of control the entire 3 branches of government are these days.
I agree electronic activated they need not have jurisdiction battle going on and it is too had to get warrants in multiply places at the same time and execute them at the same time. However this is something the congress and president are suppose to decide not the Supreme court.
Now, the authorities could search my local computer, and possibly find incriminating info in my browser's cache or some such. But that would be your simple, not-very-clever, criminals.
On the one hand, I sympathize with law enforcement that people are able to store and access data scattered across the globe and that makes it really difficult to gather evidence. On the other hand, I fear the ever-watching (and gathering) eye of big government.