Enough is Enough – Location Tracking, Mosaic Theory, and Machine Learning – Steven M. Bellovin, Renée M. Hutchins, Tony Jebara, Sebastian Zimmeck. New York University Journal of Law & Liberty, vol 8:555, 2014. “Since 1967, when it decided Katz v. United States, the Supreme Court has tied the right to be free of unwanted government scrutiny to the concept of reasonable… Continue Reading
Accurate, Focused Research on Law, Technology and Knowledge Discovery Since 2002
Category Archives: Courts
Senate Holds Hearing on Consumer Location Privacy Protection
EPIC – “The Senate recently held a hearing on the Location Privacy Protection Act of 2014 authored by Senator Franken. In an opening statement, Senator Franken said his “bill makes sure that if a company wants to get your location…they need to get your permission first.” FTC Director, Jessica Rich, testified that location data is “sensitive information” that “raises privacy concerns.” The… Continue Reading
EPIC v. NSA: EPIC Obtains Presidential Directive for Cybersecurity
EPIC – After almost five years, EPIC has obtained National Security Presidential Directive 54. The previously classified Presidential Directive contains the full text of the Comprehensive National Cybersecurity Initiative and “establishes United States policy, strategy, guidelines, and implementation actions to secure cyberspace.” This Directive, which is the foundational legal document for all cybersecurity policies in the… Continue Reading
Judge Releases Information about Police Use of Stingray Cell Phone Trackers – ACLU
“A Florida judge has sided with the ACLU to order release of information about police use of “stingrays,” which are invasive surveillance devices that send out powerful signals to trick cell phones into transmitting their locations and identifying information. The Tallahassee judge’s pro-transparency decision stands in contrast to extreme secrecy surrounding stingray records in another… Continue Reading
The Texas Tribune and Oyez® to launch multimedia site for Texas high courts
IIT Chicago Kent College of Law – “Texas will soon benefit from an online archive for its two highest courts, launched through a partnership between The Texas Tribune and Oyez®, a free law project at IIT Chicago-Kent College of Law, with support from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. Amidst a scarcity of news coverage about… Continue Reading
Cooperation with government by key leader of hacking group results in lesser sentence
Kim Zetter, Wired – As a reward for his extensive cooperation helping prosecutors hunt down his fellow hackers, the government is seeking time served for the long-awaited sentencing of top LulzSec leader Hector Xavier Monsegur, also known as “Sabu.” After delaying his sentencing for nearly three years, the government has asked a federal court to sentence Monsegur… Continue Reading
New Paper – The (Non) Finality of Supreme Court Opinions
Adam Liptak, New York Times: “The Supreme Court has been quietly revising its decisions years after they were issued, altering the law of the land without public notice. The revisions include “truly substantive changes in factual statements and legal reasoning,” said Richard J. Lazarus, a law professor at Harvard and the author of a new study examining the phenomenon. The court… Continue Reading
Psychological Perspectives: Cognition and Decision Making
Findley, Keith A. and O’Brien, Barbara, Psychological Perspectives: Cognition and Decision Making (May 19, 2014). Chapter Three in Examining Wrongful Convictions: Stepping Back, Moving Forward, Carolina Academic Press, 2014 Forthcoming. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=2438869 “In this chapter from the forthcoming edited volume entitled, EXAMINING WRONGFUL CONVICTIONS: STEPPING BACK, MOVING FORWARD, we offer an overview of what… Continue Reading
EPIC Obtains Letter Concerning DOJ Non-Investigation of Google Street View
“Pursuant to the Freedom of Information Act, EPIC has obtained the closing letter from the Department of Justice to Google attorneys in the Street View matter. The letter briefly mentions Google’s interception and collection of private Wi-Fi communications across the United States over several years. The disclosure of the activity occurred after a European data protection authority discovered that… Continue Reading
Arizona Driving Changes in Criminal Immigration Re-entry Prosecutions
“The latest available data from the Justice Department covering the first six months of FY 2014 indicate that substantial changes are occurring in the criminal enforcement of the immigration laws, particularly among those districts along the border with Mexico. Overall, the new data document a drop in the number of criminal prosecutions for illegal entry… Continue Reading
EU Court of Justice – Google Must Remove Links Upon Request
Court of Justice of the European Union, News Release No 70/14 Luxembourg, 13 May 2014. Judgment in Case C-131/12 Google Spain SL, Google Inc. v Agencia Española de Protección de Datos, Mario Costeja González. “An internet search engine operator is responsible for the processing that it carries out of personal data which appear on web pages… Continue Reading
Securities/Commodities/Exchange Civil Filings Jump 43%
“The latest available data from the federal courts show that during March 2014 the government reported a 43 percent jump in new securities/commodities/exchange civil filings. According to the case-by-case information analyzed by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC), there were 93 new filings in March, up from 65 in February. It is too soon to… Continue Reading
