Geofence warrants that tap into Google’s vast database of user location history are facing their first legal challenges
By David Uberti Close David Uberti July 27, 2020 5:30 am ET Police use of a type of warrant to monitor Google users’ locations en masse is staring down its first legal and political challenges as scrutiny of law enforcement tactics grows.
Privacy advocates fear that compliance by Google could lead authorities to seek similar data from fitness trackers, ride-share apps and other companies if more of those businesses begin to store users’ granular location histories to hone their products and services. New York state Sen. Luis Sepúlveda, a Democrat who chairs the state senate’s Crime Victims, Crime and Correction Committee, co-sponsored a bill in April to outlaw the warrants and informal requests for such data. Mr. Sepúlveda warned that geofence warrants would be used disproportionately in communities of color like many other police tactics, such as stop-and-frisk.
How Google Complies With Geofence Warrants The tech company created a three-step process for fulfilling authorities’ geofence warrants while maintaining as much user privacy as possible, according to court documents. Lawyers for the company didn’t take a position on the warrant in Mr. Chatrie’s case, according to court documents. But they called the tactic “a significant incursion on privacy” while highlighting a potential for imprecise data. A company spokesman declined to share the number of warrants it receives.
Ride-sharing company Lyft Inc. potentially would comply if warrants don’t target “all users in a large geographical area,” a spokeswoman said, or for “overly broad time periods,” among other criteria. She didn’t define those terms.
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