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SUPREME COURT GPS RULING | editorial

Is a phone a tracking device?

  January 28, 2012

The Supreme Court ruled unanimously this week that officers who placed, without a warrant, a GPS device on a suspect’s car violated the Fourth Amendment’s prohibition against “unreasonable searches and seizures.’’ It was an important vindication of privacy rights in the digital age. But the reasoning of a five-vote majority of justices didn’t go far enough - and left a lot of ambiguity in area of law begging for more clarity.

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