Marchingontogether
TK Veteran
A US federal magistrate judge has recently denied a government warrant request to search someone’s mac.com e-mail address. The industry observers were surprised because the judges usually allow the government to spy on everyone.
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It was explained that the case in question involved alleged corruption and conspiracy by a defense contractor. However, the judge said that the government had been submitting overly broad warrants while failing to make any effort to balance the law enforcement interests against the expectation of privacy that people normally have in their communications.
Apparently, federal authorities required the judge to grant the warrant request asking for “all records or other data stored by a person using each account: including address books, contact and buddy lists, pictures, and files”, along with logged IP addresses, billing details, and so on. In response, the judge pointed out that although the government was after e-mails from December to the present, nothing explicitly requested that Apple gives the government any e-mails.
The judge believes that this confusion was caused by poor drafting, but he promised to allow the police to take anything they like. The judge thought that the government was using language that could confuse Apple – and the latter has the job to work out what data must be given to the government in the hope of clarifying the situation.
Finally, the judge said that the court shouldn’t be placed in the position of compelling the tech giant to work out what the government actually wants to find. So, until this application is clarified, it will be denied in court.
20131221_usd001.jpg
It was explained that the case in question involved alleged corruption and conspiracy by a defense contractor. However, the judge said that the government had been submitting overly broad warrants while failing to make any effort to balance the law enforcement interests against the expectation of privacy that people normally have in their communications.
Apparently, federal authorities required the judge to grant the warrant request asking for “all records or other data stored by a person using each account: including address books, contact and buddy lists, pictures, and files”, along with logged IP addresses, billing details, and so on. In response, the judge pointed out that although the government was after e-mails from December to the present, nothing explicitly requested that Apple gives the government any e-mails.
The judge believes that this confusion was caused by poor drafting, but he promised to allow the police to take anything they like. The judge thought that the government was using language that could confuse Apple – and the latter has the job to work out what data must be given to the government in the hope of clarifying the situation.
Finally, the judge said that the court shouldn’t be placed in the position of compelling the tech giant to work out what the government actually wants to find. So, until this application is clarified, it will be denied in court.