Robert Frommer, a senior attorney at The Institute for Justice, writes:
Geofence warrants are powerful tools that let law enforcement identify devices located at a specific location and time based on data users send to Google LLC and other tech companies. But left unchecked, they threaten to empower police to invade the security of millions of Americans. Thankfully, there is a way that geofence warrants can be used in a constitutional manner, if only courts would take it.
[…]
That refinement begins with the courts. Recall that, after issuing a geofence warrant, courts check themselves out from the process, leaving Google to fend for itself. But courts, not corporations, should safeguard our rights. That means geofence warrants require an iterative process that ensures judicial oversight at each step.
Under that iterative process, courts would still issue geofence warrants. But after Step 1, things would change. Rather than go to Google, the police would return to court. They would identify what devices from the Step 1 list they want expanded location data for. And they would have to justify that further intrusion to the court, which would then evaluate the request and denote the subset of devices for which police could constitutionally get expanded data.
Read more at Law360.