Unsealed court documents show that Google provided police with information about users simply based on their keyword searches, which some say could be a violation of U.S. civil rights. A recently unsealed court document showed that investigators could query a person’s search history in reverse, asking Google to reveal anyone who searched for a keyword rather than information about a known suspect.
Police can track Google searches if they have a court order permitting them to do so. Google collects data regarding its users’ browsing histories, and police officers may access it if a legal mandate allows for their collection. Google is known to be willing and compliant with officers’ requests for user search history.
Police usually have to focus on one suspect before issuing a warrant to Google instructing them to provide the search history of those people, but keyword warrants undermine this practice.
Keyword warrants allow police to identify anyone and everyone who may be searching for certain terms in case one of them may be involved in a crime. Typically, you will need to ask law enforcement or prosecutors for the search warrant file number or the date the judge approved the search and a description of what the search was about in order to obtain the search warrant file from the clerk. document. These search warrant documents are separate from the actual criminal case in which people are charged with a crime (a search warrant is usually obtained from the police before a formal arrest or case is charged).
Police Still Need Search Warrants
For a typical search warrant, the police must convince the judge that they have probable reason to believe that evidence of a crime will be found at the location or object of the search. If the police need to break into your property to look at evidence they want to use in court, they usually need a search warrant to do so.
In some situations, such as when suspects cannot destroy evidence, the police may search and confiscate your property in your home without a warrant. If the police show up at your door and ask if they can come in to look for drugs and you agree to a search, then the police don’t need a warrant.
If you are arrested or taken into police custody, you must verbally state that you do not consent to the search of your device. As part of a criminal investigation, police must obtain written permission from a judge to search private property (unless the property owner agrees to the search). Police and other investigators will be able to request a search warrant from a judge, which can then be submitted to Google.
The Contentiousness of Police Investigating Web Searches
It is unclear how long the request led to an arrest or conviction, as many investigations are still ongoing and judges frequently issue warrants. The original search warrant sent to Google remains sealed, but the report is yet another example of a data request to Google where investigators are asking for data on a large number of users, rather than a specific request for a single suspect.
To track down the perpetrators, federal investigators began using new “keyword warrants” and using them to ask Google to provide them with information about anyone searching for a victim’s name or address within a given year. , accidentally opened the courtroom, according to a document found by Forbes.
In 2017, Minnesota police issued an arrest warrant to Google for information about people who searched for “Douglas [REDACTED]” during a fraud investigation, including name, address, phone number, social security number, and IP address. CNET reported that investigators issued a search warrant to Google for information on users looking for addresses of nearby homes in a timely manner to correct the situation.
Google responded with data in mid-2020 after being asked to provide all of the Google accounts and corresponding IP addresses of those who performed the searches, although court documents did not reveal how many users submitted data to the government. The order requires Google to provide identifying data for all users who search for these and other related terms within four days.
Geofencing and Other Cybersecurity Issues Raise Barriers for Investigators
Investigators who spoke to The New York Times said they did not send geofencing warrants to companies other than Google, and Apple said it could not perform such searches. According to the New York Times, Google is the main company that appears to be fulfilling the mandates (Apple says it cannot provide this information to the authorities).
Last year, the US Supreme Court ruled that authorities must obtain a search warrant and provide a possible reason for obtaining location records from third parties such as Google, even though Google has already decided that Google will seek warrants to deliver the data. Last year, the Supreme Court ruled that a warrant was needed for weeks of historical data on a person’s mobile phone location, but the court has not ruled on anything like a geofence search, including a technique that extracts information about all phones registered on a repeater.
In 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that police cannot arbitrarily install a GPS on a vehicle and track its movement (nationwide v. Jones, 565 US 400), and in 2014, police officers routinely require a warrant to search an arrestee’s cell phone. (Riley v. California, 134 S. Ct. 2473). The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that obtaining these documents constituted a Fourth Amendment search, and police needed to obtain a probable warrant of action.
Google doesn’t go into details about what Google turned over to investigators, but it’s theoretically possible that the police had access to search history, email, documents, and other targets.
Authorities can access unopened emails from the past 180 days, but first they must obtain a warrant. So far, several courts have ruled that e-mail content requires a warrant regardless of the age of the e-mails, and service providers usually require a warrant before agreeing to deliver them. Law enforcement is only authorized to conduct an unreasonable search of your device if a good reason can be presented in an emergency 3 days ago.
