In the case of Seymour v. Colorado, Denver police executed a search warrant that required Google to provide the IP addresses of anyone who had searched for...
It wasn’t specific to an individual criminal, though. Police aren’t allowed to get warrants for fishing expeditions, they’re supposed to find leads themselves and then get a concise warrant to evidence to confirm that. They searched people they had no right to search, and violated their constitutional rights.
Yes exactly. This story has echos of the guy who was hounded by police (and maybe even charged and convicted?) because he took a different route while cycling and rode past a house where a crime was committed. That, too, was Google.
Yeah, it’s a specific enough request that I don’t see any problem here.
Although, why the IP address? I would imagine most people using Google products would be logged into Google accounts. They’d probably know the exact account who made the search, rather than a vague IP that could belong to multiple people in.
Fair enough. I don’t think it’s common for someone to be doing Google searches without having an account linked to other services, though.
Anyone using YouTube, Gmail, etc. would be logged in.
And everyone with an android phone who uses google search would very likely be linked to an account, for example.
I just thought it would cut to the chase for Google to provide account holder info and not just IP addresses.
Then again, the arsonists could have very well used any of the other search engines to look up the address. So… maybe police aren’t aware that other search options exist.
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It wasn’t specific to an individual criminal, though. Police aren’t allowed to get warrants for fishing expeditions, they’re supposed to find leads themselves and then get a concise warrant to evidence to confirm that. They searched people they had no right to search, and violated their constitutional rights.
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Would you still feel the same way if the DMV was set on fire and you were a suspect because you’d searched for directions to the place?
Or if you had searched that home address because you were looking for homes in the area to compare with what you wanted?
It shouldn’t be enough to make a Google search to assume an individual is a suspect in a crime.
Yes exactly. This story has echos of the guy who was hounded by police (and maybe even charged and convicted?) because he took a different route while cycling and rode past a house where a crime was committed. That, too, was Google.
Yeah, it’s a specific enough request that I don’t see any problem here.
Although, why the IP address? I would imagine most people using Google products would be logged into Google accounts. They’d probably know the exact account who made the search, rather than a vague IP that could belong to multiple people in.
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Fair enough. I don’t think it’s common for someone to be doing Google searches without having an account linked to other services, though.
Anyone using YouTube, Gmail, etc. would be logged in.
And everyone with an android phone who uses google search would very likely be linked to an account, for example.
I just thought it would cut to the chase for Google to provide account holder info and not just IP addresses.
Then again, the arsonists could have very well used any of the other search engines to look up the address. So… maybe police aren’t aware that other search options exist.
deleted by creator