Adam Wise reports: After more than two years of debate, the fate of an open records request involving Wisconsin Rapids teacher e-mail messages now rests with the state’s highest court. Seven State Supreme Court justices spent more than an hour Tuesday morning questioning an attorney representing the Wisconsin Rapids School District and one representing five…
Category: U.S.
EPIC sues Homeland Security for info about digital strip search devices
EPIC filed a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit challenging the Department of Homeland Security’s failure to make public details about the agency’s Whole Body Imaging program. The devices capture detailed naked images of air travelers in the United States. After the agency announced that the body scanners would become the primary screening device in US…
The PC Privacy Battle at the Border
Richard Adhikari reports: Border protection agents have extensive rights to search electronic devices that travelers take with them through U.S. ports of entry. However, relatively few searches are actually conducted. Border agencies insist they have no interest in holding up legitimate travelers, but civil liberties groups maintain agencies’ policies on searching electronics are too broad…
Court: Compulsory taking of DNA from pretrial detainee violates Fourth Amendment
FourthAmendment.com brings us a court opinion out of Pennsylvania that is quoteworthy: A DNA profile generates investigatory evidence that is primarily used by law enforcement officials for general law enforcement purposes. To allow such suspicionless searches, which are conducted in almost all instances with law enforcement involvement, to occur absent traditional warrant and probable cause…