Powerful warrants for keywords are now being deemed contradictory to Colorado’s Constitution and the 4th Amendment. And the news comes after a legal case was brought forward in the state’s district court in Denver recently.
Officials added how it’s curbing some major law enforcement practices that are said to have a greater number of implications in regards to making abortion a crime.
For those who may not be aware, reverse keyword practices are another name for surveillance techniques that allows the cops to begin with a particular word of interest and then goes about identifying those users that carried out searches in regards to that particular period.
To be more specific, that means highlighting all of those users that are on the lookout for particular details like user name or perhaps an address. It could also be related to users on the lookout for abortion drugs and other sensitive areas of interest.
While certain interested parties feel the mechanism is just another way to help law enforcement agencies delineate the bad guys or criminals from the good guys, other civil rights activists believe they’re another huge threat to privacy.
Now, we’ve got a huge legal challenge in front of us related to such warrants and how in line they are with the state’s laws.
One senior advocate hailing from the association for criminal lawyers says his client had been identified through one of these keyword search warrants and now, the client claims that such information needs to be suppressed before it’s too late.
These searches are being hailed as something that’s totally new and not actually similar to what we’ve seen in the recent past, explained the advocate who even goes as far as mentioning that they’re so different from other searches, making them against the country’s law.
Media outlet Forbes was quick to mention how this particular case was related to a particular incident of the past involving an arson tragedy where some teens set an entire residential home on fire in Denver. And that is what resulted in a mighty blaze that took away so many members of the same family, including some young females.
Yes, those suspects were identified amongst all others but the legal case revolving around using evidence through keyword warrants and how the cops end up requesting more information from Google is just not something people are willing to accept for obvious reasons.
A recent article by the Denver Post highlighted how the police were willing to go to great extents to have the suspects identified and if that meant embarking on such invasive means and warrants for surveillance, then so be it.
The police had first carried out their own keyword warrant search. Next, they requested Google for more information including the address of the home where the fire had taken place. And last but not least, the cops wanted more details about how else had searched for the home’s address, adding another mode of surveillance. And in the end, they managed to grab a hold of the suspects.
Encompassing data belonging to billions of users on Google is definitely not something that many are viewing positively. They feel that this way, the cops can get any sort of private information leaked through data banks whose access belongs to search engine giants like Google
For now, all that we know is that reverse keyword warrants are yet to be deemed legal by the court of law. Hence, it’s going to be interesting to see what the final result of this legal proceeding turns out to be.
H/T: TV
Read next: New Study Reveals Serious Privacy Concerns in Period Tracking Apps
Officials added how it’s curbing some major law enforcement practices that are said to have a greater number of implications in regards to making abortion a crime.
For those who may not be aware, reverse keyword practices are another name for surveillance techniques that allows the cops to begin with a particular word of interest and then goes about identifying those users that carried out searches in regards to that particular period.
To be more specific, that means highlighting all of those users that are on the lookout for particular details like user name or perhaps an address. It could also be related to users on the lookout for abortion drugs and other sensitive areas of interest.
While certain interested parties feel the mechanism is just another way to help law enforcement agencies delineate the bad guys or criminals from the good guys, other civil rights activists believe they’re another huge threat to privacy.
Now, we’ve got a huge legal challenge in front of us related to such warrants and how in line they are with the state’s laws.
One senior advocate hailing from the association for criminal lawyers says his client had been identified through one of these keyword search warrants and now, the client claims that such information needs to be suppressed before it’s too late.
These searches are being hailed as something that’s totally new and not actually similar to what we’ve seen in the recent past, explained the advocate who even goes as far as mentioning that they’re so different from other searches, making them against the country’s law.
Media outlet Forbes was quick to mention how this particular case was related to a particular incident of the past involving an arson tragedy where some teens set an entire residential home on fire in Denver. And that is what resulted in a mighty blaze that took away so many members of the same family, including some young females.
Yes, those suspects were identified amongst all others but the legal case revolving around using evidence through keyword warrants and how the cops end up requesting more information from Google is just not something people are willing to accept for obvious reasons.
A recent article by the Denver Post highlighted how the police were willing to go to great extents to have the suspects identified and if that meant embarking on such invasive means and warrants for surveillance, then so be it.
The police had first carried out their own keyword warrant search. Next, they requested Google for more information including the address of the home where the fire had taken place. And last but not least, the cops wanted more details about how else had searched for the home’s address, adding another mode of surveillance. And in the end, they managed to grab a hold of the suspects.
Encompassing data belonging to billions of users on Google is definitely not something that many are viewing positively. They feel that this way, the cops can get any sort of private information leaked through data banks whose access belongs to search engine giants like Google
For now, all that we know is that reverse keyword warrants are yet to be deemed legal by the court of law. Hence, it’s going to be interesting to see what the final result of this legal proceeding turns out to be.
H/T: TV
Read next: New Study Reveals Serious Privacy Concerns in Period Tracking Apps
