ACLU blog: ACLU Suit Shows the DOJ Gathered Location Data Without Probable Cause

ACLU blog: ACLU Suit Shows the DOJ Gathered Location Data Without Probable Cause by Linda Lye:

After three years of litigation, we’ve finally settled a portion of one of our long-running Freedom of Information Act suits against the federal government for information about its location tracking practices. A person’s digital location information reveals detailed, private information that the government should only be able to get through a warrant based on probable cause. As part of this settlement, the government provided us with information about the types of court orders it obtains to get location information.

In particular, we learned that from 2008 to 2012, the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of California overwhelmingly relied on so-called “hybrid orders” to obtain location information. Unlike more privacy-protective warrants that require probable cause, hybrid orders have a lower burden of proof. In other words, with hybrid orders, the government doesn’t need to show an especially good reason to snoop into your location history.