US Govt tracking millions of people with cell phones

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) claimed that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) used huge volumes of people’s cell phone location information to track their movements.

The records, which the ACLU obtained over the course of the last year through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, casted new light on the government’s ability to obtain the most private information by simply opening the federal wallet.

The documents expose those companies’ and the government’s attempts to rationalise this unrestrained sale of massive quantities of data in the face of US Supreme Court precedent protecting similar cell phone location data against warrantless government access.

Throughout the documents, the cell phone location information is variously characterised as mere digital exhaust and as containing no PII (personally identifying information) because it is associated with a cell phone’s numerical identifier rather than a name a” even though the entire purpose of this data is to be able to identify and track people.

These documents are further proof that Congress needs to pass the Fourth Amendment Is Not For Sale Act, which would end law enforcement agencies’ practice of buying their way around the Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement. The ACLU said that the lawmakers must seize the opportunity to end this massive privacy invasion without delay.