Privacy
276 Articles
Why (Some) Secrecy is Good for Civil Liberties
A few weeks back, Ben Wittes wrote a controversial post over at Lawfare on the latest Snowden disclosures, arguing that, “If you’re okay with dumping in the lap of a journalist…
Major New United Nations Report Rebukes Five Eyes’ Attempts to Weaken Digital Privacy Rights
The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) released a significant report last week analyzing the meaning of the human right to privacy in relation…
The PCLOB Report and Eight Questions About Section 702
Note: The views expressed below are my own and do not necessarily represent the views of PCLOB or its other Board members. On July 2, Professor Jennifer Granick posed the question:…
UK Government Proposes Creation of its own Privacy and Civil Liberties (Oversight) Board
The U.K. government announced this week its intention to replace the Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation with a new Independent Privacy and Civil Liberties Board. The…
The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly: An unfortunate story on the non-review of U.S. surveillance authority in Section 702
Federal oversight agency punts on international human rights, while findings the programs lawful and constitutional The President’s Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board (“PCLOB”)…
Did PCLOB Answer My Eight Questions About Section 702?
TL;DR: A little bit, but not enough. Yesterday, the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board (PCLOB) issued a massive report about the legally and technologically complicated…
Cloud City: A Fourth Amendment Thought Experiment
Reading the Privacy & Civil Liberties Oversight Board’s rather tepid report on NSA surveillance under §702 of the FISA Amendments Act last night, I found myself thinking…
Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board Releases Report on Section 702 Surveillance (Full Text)
On Tuesday evening, the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board (PCLOB)—an independent body within the Executive Branch—released a major report concerning the National…
Riley v. California — An Important Step Forward, but How Far Forward?
The joined cases of Riley v. California and United States v. Wurie rightly have been hailed as a ringing endorsement of privacy in the digital age. By holding that police may…
Pleasant Surprises – and One Disappointment – in the Supreme Court’s Cell Phone Decision
As commentators quickly recognized, there’s just cause for celebration in this week’s Supreme Court decision in Riley v. California, requiring a warrant to search an arrestee’s…
SCOTUS & Cell Phone Searches: Digital is Different
Today, the Supreme Court unanimously invalidated warrantless searches of cell phones incident to arrest in Riley v. California and United States v. Wurie. Full disclosure: my colleagues…
Eleventh Circuit Says No to Warrantless Cell Tracking, Calls Other Metadata Programs Into Question
Today, the Eleventh Circuit rejected the exceedingly common law enforcement practice of warrantlessly tracking suspects’ physical location using cell phone tower data. The opinion,…