Privacy in the digital age

Published: January 25, 2012

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Reconciling individual privacy rights with the digital age is one of the great constitutional challenges of modern times.

The Supreme Court of the United States took a big step in the right direction Monday. Its ruling should guide Congress in upgrading restrictions on digital surveillance techniques, and the court itself in other cases that are certain to arise.

In a rare unanimous decision, the court found that police, in effect, conducted an illegal search when, without a warrant, they attached a GPS tracking device to the car of a suspected Washington, D.C., drug dealer. That upheld a lower court's decision to overturn the suspect's conviction because of the illegal search.

All nine justices concurred but issued three separate opinions, demonstrating the vastness of the issue. They wrote of many of the traditional issues in 4th Amendment cases, such as expectations of privacy, but also of the difficulty of applying conventional standards to digital surveillance techniques.

Exponential increases in the ability to electronically gather information ensure that this case will be just one of many. More than 322 million cellphones, for example, include technology that enables wireless providers to locate them - which could be helpful or harmful depending on how the technology is applied. And a whole universe of privacy issues arises from Internet usage.

Sen. Patrick Leahy, the Vermont Democrat who heads the Senate Judiciary Committee, wants to upgrade the Electronic Communications Privacy Act of 1986 to cover new technology.

Congress should do so, using the Supreme Court's decision as clear guidance to emphasize privacy over surveillance.

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