David Kravets writes: A federal appeals court Thursday upheld a voter-approved measure requiring California authorities to take a DNA sample from every adult arrested on felony accusations in the Golden State. The American Civil Liberties Union, which brought the challenge in hopes of striking down the measure, argued that DNA sampling of arrestees was an unconstitutional Fourth Amendment…
Category: U.S.
How Internet Companies Would Be Forced to Spy on You Under H.R. 1981
Rainey Reitman writes: Online commentators are pointing to the Internet backlash against H.R. 1981 as the new anti-SOPA movement. While this bill is strikingly different from the Stop Online Piracy Act, it does have one thing in common: it’s a poorly-considered legislative attempt to regulate the Internet in a way experts in the field know will have…
Ruling Stands: Defendant Must Decrypt Laptop
David Kravets reports: A federal appeals court is rejecting an appeal from a bank-fraud defendant who has been ordered to decrypt her laptop so its contents can be used in her criminal case. Colorado federal authorities seized the encrypted Toshiba laptop from defendant Ramona Fricosu in 2010 with valid court warrants while investigating alleged mortgage…
Government Pressures Twitter to Hand Over Keys to Occupy Wall Street Protester’s Location Data Without a Warrant
Hanni Fakhoury of EFF writes about the Twitter subpoena I previously mentioned on this blog. … The subpoena is astonishing not only for its poor grammar, but also for the breadth of information the government wants for a trivial crime that hardly requires it. The government’s request that Twitter hand over Tweets is unlikely to…