Submitted via IRC for Runaway1956
In a victory for privacy rights at the border, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit today ruled that forensic searches of electronic devices carried out by border agents without any suspicion that the traveler has committed a crime violate the U.S. Constitution.
The ruling in U.S. v. Kolsuz is the first federal appellate case after the Supreme Court's seminal decision in Riley v. California (2014) to hold that certain border device searches require individualized suspicion that the traveler is involved in criminal wrongdoing. Two other federal appellate opinions this year—from the Fifth Circuit and Eleventh Circuit—included strong analyses by judges who similarly questioned suspicionless border device searches.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Monday May 14 2018, @05:20PM (1 child)
That pushes us to the next problem: warrants are way too easy to get, because there are no consequences for carefully-worded abuses.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 15 2018, @05:26PM
Yes every system can be abused, but I'll gladly take the warrant route over nothing. As long as they require a judge to be inconvenienced that is, if they automate warrants where officers can just check the boxes and get authorization then fuck that.