[Noisebridge-discuss] 4th amendment not applying to cell phones

[travis+ml-noisebridge at subspacefield.org]

Quoting:

===

The People v. Gregory Diaz: Twisting The Fourth Amendment

In a disturbing decision issued in this new year, the California Supreme
Court ruled 5 to
<http://motorists.us1.list-manage.com/track/click?u=b1cabcf107071c4341a0eda23&id=772b52471e&e=bd37fb3dda>
that the Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution does not apply to cell
phones and stored information on those phones.

Here is the exact wording of the Fourth Amendment:

*The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and
effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated,
and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or
affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the
persons or things to be seized.*

Gregory Diaz was arrested in Ventura County on a drug charge. The police
confiscated his cell phone during the arrest and used information from text
messages saved on the phone as evidence to help obtain a conviction.

The case reached the state???s highest court when the Diaz defense team
appealed to have the text message information excluded because the police
did not have a search warrant for the phone.

The majority opinion of the California Supreme Court allowed that cell
phones are essentially a part of a person???s clothing. The U.S. Supreme Court
had previously ruled in favor of warrantless searches of items immediately
associated with an arrested person, such as clothing or cigarette packets.

===

Apparently the CA supreme court doesn't understand the point of a
Terry Frisk:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry_v._Ohio

Sounds like a job for Whisper Systems:

http://www.whispersys.com/

I wonder if anyone has started encrypting the phone flash memory yet.
-- 
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