Fourth Amendment as Applied to Online Privacy

Scope

• Use this page to list sources related to online or computer privacy issues in which there is a government actor that implicates Fourth Amendment concerns. Where no government entity is involved in a privacy matter, or where the claims are purely statutory or based in the common law, then the source should probably be listed instead in Statutory and Common Law Claims to Protect Online Privacy.

News / Editorial

• Kim Zetter, Judge: Bradley Manning supporter can sue government over border search, Ars Technica (Mar. 29, 2012).
• Ryan Singel, NSA Chief Denies, Denies, Denies Wired’s Domestic Spying Story, Wired (Mar. 20, 2012).
• James Bamford, The NSA Is Building the Country’s Biggest Spy Center (Watch What You Say), Wired (Mar. 15, 2012).
• David Kravets, ACLU sues over warrantless border laptop searches, Wired.com (Sep. 7, 2010).
• Kevin Bankston, Government Backs Down in Yahoo! Email Privacy Case, Electronic Frontier Foundation (Apr. 16, 2010).
• Kevin Poulson, Spam Suspect Uses Google Docs; FBI Happy, Threat Level Blog, Wired.com (Apr. 16, 2010).
• S.D.Fla.: Leaving flash drive in a common computer is a waiver of any expectation of privacy, FourthAmendment.com (Apr. 14, 2010).
• KL Tech Muse, Cloud Computing and the Fourth Amendment, Geek News Central (Mar. 31, 2010).
• Coalition Calls for Reform of Electronic Privacy Law, Infosecurity.com (Apr. 1, 2010).
• Paula Bernier, Google, AT&T, Microsoft, Others Ally to Call for Online Privacy Reform, The DNS Zone (Mar. 31, 2010).
• David Perera, Reform the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, Says New Coalition, Fierce Government IT (Mar. 31, 2010).
• David Gewirtz and Doug Hanchard, What's Inside Your Home Is Yours, Except Computer Files, ZDNet (Mar. 31, 2010).
• Charlie Savage and James Risen, Federal Judge Finds N.S.A. Wiretapping Program Illegal, The NY Times (Mar. 31, 2010).
• Richard Esguerra, EFF Testifies to Congress on Need for New Privacy Protections Against Hidden Video Surveillance, Electronic Frontier Foundation (Mar. 30, 2010).
• Declan McCullagh, Tech coalition pushes rewrite of online privacy law, CNET News, (Mar. 29, 2010).
• Orin Kerr, Eleventh Circuit Decision Largely Eliminates Fourth Amendment Protection in E-Mail, Volokh Conspiracy, (Mar. 15, 2010).
• Declan McCullagh, FBI Wants Records Kept of Web Sites Visited, CNET (Feb. 5, 2010).
• Janie Lorber, House Passes Cybersecurity Bill, The NY Times (Feb. 4, 2010).
• Declan McCullagh, Appeals court lets Google Street View suit continue, CNET News (Jan. 29, 2010).
• Thomas J. Prohaska, Drunk driver gets into more trouble after posting Facebook photo, The Buffalo News (Jan. 28, 2010).
• James Urquhart, Does the Fourth Amendment cover 'the cloud'?, CNET (Jan. 17, 2010).
• Stephen Majors, Ohio justices: Cell phone searches require warrant, Associated Press (Dec. 15, 2009).
• Elinor Mills, EFF sues feds for info on social-network surveillance, CNET (Dec. 1, 2009).
• Carrie Johnson, Obama Tightens State Secrets Standard, Washington Post (Sep. 23, 2009).
• Julian Sanchez, A Chance to Fix the PATRIOT Act?, Cato@Liberty (Sep. 17, 2009).
• John Timmer, New DHS laptop search policy: crap sandwich, fancier bread, Ars Technica (Aug. 28, 2009).
• Eileen Sullivan, Tighter oversight on border laptop searches, San Francisco Chronicle (Aug. 27, 2009).
• Mark Hamblett, ACLU, Government Square Off Over Warrantless Wiretaps Abroad, New York Law Journal (Jul. 23, 2009).
• Jon Stokes, Warrantless wiretaps just the tip of the (classified) iceberg, Ars Technica (Jul. 14, 2009).
• Jon Stokes, Report: NSA surveillance program too secret for its own good, Ars Technica (Jul. 14, 2009).
• Josh Meyer, Report: Bush-era surveillance went beyond wiretaps, Los Angeles Times (Jul. 11, 2009).
• Jon Stokes, EFF brief accuses DOJ of "backdoor wiretapping", Ars Technica (Jun. 12, 2009).
• Declan McCullagh, FBI spyware used to nab hackers, extortionists, CNET (Apr. 17, 2009).
• Matt Zimmerman, Boston College Campus Police: "Using Prompt Commands" May Be a Sign of Criminal Activity, EFF Deeplinks (Apr. 14, 2009).
• Tim Jones, In Warrantless Wiretapping Case, Obama DOJ's New Arguments Are Worse Than Bush's, EFF Deeplinks (Apr. 7, 2009).
• Julian Sanchez, Interim report on NSA wiretap program released, Ars Technica (Apr. 1, 2009).
• Julian Sanchez, New bill would tighten rules for National Security Letters, Ars Technica (Mar. 31, 2009).
• Nova, The Spy Factory, PBS (Feb. 3, 2009).
• Mitchell Zimmerman, Privacy Alert: Gov't Rummaging Through Your Laptop's Contents? No Problem If You're Re-Entering USA, Says Ninth Circuit (Apr. 30, 2008).
• Julian Sanchez, Appeals court puts restrictions on NSL gag orders, Ars Technica (Dec. 15, 2008).
• ACLU, Constitution-free Zone.
• Ellen Nakashima, Travelers' Laptops May Be Detained At Border: No Suspicion Required Under DHS Policies, Washington Post (Aug. 8, 2008).
• Ryan Singel, Border Laptop Searches? No Reason Needed, Wired.com (Aug. 1, 2008).

Legal Briefs / Opinions / Statutes

• House v. Napolitano, No. 11-10852 (D. Md Mar. 28, 2012) (denying motion to dismiss claims re violation of 1st and 4th amendment rights due to border laptop seizure).
• United States v. Cotterman, No. 09-10139 (9th Cir. Mar. 19, 2012) (granting rehearing en banc).
• In the Matter of an Application of the United States of America for an Order Authorizing the Release of Historical Cell-Site Information, No. 10-MC-897 (NGG) (E.D.N.Y. Aug. 22, 2011).
• City of Ontario v. Quon, No. 08-1332 (U.S. Jun. 17, 2010).
• United States v. Hanson, No. 09-00946 (N.D. Cal. Jun. 2, 2010) (search of a laptop conducted six months after seizure at airport customs required a warrant even where earlier searches and discovery of contraband were supported by reasonable suspicion).
• Al-Haramain Islamic Foundation v. Obama, No. 07-0109 (N.D. Cal. Mar. 31, 2010)(finding that American lawyers for an Islamic foundation were illegally wiretapped by the federal government).
• Rehberg v. Paulk, No. 09-11897 (11th Cir. Mar. 11, 2010).
• U.S. v. Cotterman, No. 07-01207, 2009 WL 465028 (D. Ariz. Feb. 24, 2009) (Order adopting Magistrate's Recommendation).
• United States v. Mann, No. 08-3041 (7th Cir. Jan. 20, 2009) (Agreeing with the dissent in the Ninth Circuit's Comprehensive Drug Testing that jettisoning the plain view doctrine entirely in digital evidence cases is an "efficient but overbroad approach" and the more considered approach "would be to allow the countours of the plain view doctrine to develop incrementally through the normal course of fact-based case adjudication.").
• United States v. Beatty, 2009 WL 5220643 (W.D. Pa. Dec. 31, 2009) (motion to suppress denied where graphic file names on a p2p network had hash fingerprints matching fingerprints of files in an Internet Crimes Against Children database and where officers searched remainder of computer after seizure without viewing p2p files or attaching them to warrant request).
• State v. Smith, Slip Opinion No. 2009-Ohio-6426 (Ohio Dec. 15, 2009) (The warrantless search of data within a cell phone seized incident to a lawful arrest is prohibited by the Fourth Amendment when the search is unnecessary for the safety of law-enforcement officers and there are no exigent circumstances.).
• Amnesty Int'l USA v. McConnell, No. 08-06259 (S.D.N.Y. Aug. 20, 2009) (plaintiff's lack standing to challenge the FISA Amendments Act because they cannot prove they are subject to spying pursuant to the Act).
• Quon v. Arch Wireless Operating Co., No. 07-55282 (9th Cir. 2008) (panel opinion) and Quon v. Arch Wireless Operating Co., No. 07-55282 (9th Cir. 2009) (Order denying rehearing en banc), cert. granted.
• United States v. Arnold, 533 F.3d 1003 (9th Cir. 2008).
• Warshak v. United States, 532 F.3d 521 (6th Cir. 2008) (en banc).
• Doe v. Ashcroft, 334 F.Supp.2d 471 (S.D.N.Y. 2004) (Vacated by, remanded by Doe I v. Gonzales, 449 F.3d 415 (2d Cir. 2006); On remand at, Summary judgment granted, in part, summary judgment denied, in part by, Motion denied by Doe v. Gonzales, 500 F. Supp. 2d 379 (S.D.N.Y., Sept. 6, 2007); Affirmed in part and reversed in part by, Remanded by John Doe, Inc. v. Mukasey, 549 F.3d 861 (2d Cir. 2008).)
• United States v. Seljan, 497 F.3d 1035 (9th Cir. 2007).
• Hepting v. AT&T, 439 F. Supp. 2d 974 (N.D. Cal. 2006).
• Guest v. Leis, 255 F.3d 325 (6th Cir. 2001).
• Steve Jackson Games v. United States Secret Service, 36 F.3d 457 (5th Cir. 1994).

Scholarship and Government Reports

• The Constitution Project, Suspicionless Border Searches of Electronic Devices: Legal and Privacy Concerns with The Department of Homeland Security’s Policy, constitutionproject.org (May 18, 2011).
• Stephen Henderson, The Timely Demise of the Fourth Amendment Third Party Doctrine, Iowa Law Review (forthcoming).
• John Lynch and Jenny Elickson, Obtaining and Using Evidence from Social Networking Sites, U.S. Department of Justice.
• Orin Kerr, Applying the Fourth Amendment to the Internet: A General Approach, Stanford Law Review (forthcoming).
• Beth George, An Administrative Law Approach to Reforming the State Secrets Privilege, 84 NYU L. Rev. 1691 (Dec. 2009).
• Patrick P. Garlinger, Privacy, Free Speech, and the Patriot Act: First and Fourth Amendment Limits on National Security Letters, 84 NYU L. Rev. 1105 (Oct. 2009).
• Eric Holder, Policies and Procedures Governing Invocation of the State Secrets Privilege, Office of the Attorney General (Sep. 23, 2009).
• Offices of Inspectors General of DoD, DoJ, CIA, NSA, and Office of the Director of Nat'l Intelligence, Unclassified Report on the President's Surveillance Program, No. 2009-0013-AS (Jul. 10, 2009).
• Sara M. Smyth, Searches of Computers and Computer Data at the United States Border: The Need for a New Framework Following United States v. Arnold, Journal of Law, Technology and Policy, Vol. 1 (2009).
• Office of the Inspector General of the Department of Justice, A Review of the FBI's Use of National Security Letters: Assessment of Corrective Actions and Examination of NSL Usage in 2006, DOJ/OIG Special Reports (Mar. 2008).
• Fred H. Cate, Government Data Mining: The Need for a Legal Framework, 43 Harv. C.R.-C.L. L. Rev. 435 (2008).
• Jon D. Michaels, All the President's Spies: Private-Public Intelligence Partnerships in the War on Terror, 96 Calif. L. Rev. 901 (2008).
• Margaret Ziegler, Pay No Attention to the Man Behind the Curtain: The Government's Increased Use of the State Secrets Privilege to Conceal Wrongdoing, 23 Berkeley Tech. L.J. 691 (2008).
• Office of the Inspector General of the Department of Justice, A Review of the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Use of National Security Letters, DOJ/OIG Special Reports (Mar. 2007).
• John Yoo , The Terrorist Surveillance Program and the Constitution, 14 Geo. Mason L. Rev. 565 (2007).
• dKosopedia, Warrantless Eavesdropping Timeline.