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AC Democracy Advantage—Stingray Violates



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2AC Democracy Advantage—Stingray Violates



StingRay capture data in an intrusive and unconstitutional manner; they should be banned for violating the Fourth Amendment.
ACLU 2014 (“StingRays: The Most Common Surveillance Tool the Government Won’t Tell You About” Online https://www.aclunc.org/sites/default/files/StingRays_The_Most_Common_Surveillance_Tool_the_Govt_Won%27t_Tell_You_About.pdf)
Federal and state law enforcement entities across the country are using a powerful cell phone surveillance tool commonly referred to as a “StingRay.” These devices are capable of locating a cell phone with extraordinary precision, but to do so they operate in dragnet fashion, scooping up information from a target device, as well as other wireless devices in the vicinity. In addition, these devices can be configured to capture the content of voice and data communications. Although the federal government has been using these devices since at least 1995, and use by state and local governments is quite widespread, there are only a handful of opinions addressing their use. At this juncture, few criminal defense attorneys are aware of these highly intrusive but extremely common surveillance tools. This is entirely understandable because the federal government has a policy of not disclosing information about this device. The government appears to be withholding information from criminal defendants. It even appears to be providing misleading information and making material omissions to judicial officers when it seeks purported court authorization to use this device – inaccurately referring to it as a “confidential source” or calling it a different kind of device (like a pen register), and failing to alert courts to constitutionally material facts about the technology, such as the full breadth of information it obtains from a suspect and its impact on third parties. As a result, courts are probably not aware that they are authorizing use of this device and have not had an opportunity to rule on its legality, except in very rare instances.

The secrecy surrounding these devices is deeply troubling because this technology raises grave constitutional questions. There is a compelling argument that StingRays should never be used. Because they operate in dragnet fashion, they engage in the electronic equivalent of the “general searches” prohibited by the Fourth Amendment. But at a minimum, law enforcement should obtain a warrant. Even in those instances when law enforcement obtains a warrant,

however, there are likely strong arguments that the warrant is invalid.


StingRay technology violates Fourth Amendment rights

Infosec 2014 (Infosec Technology Institute “StingRay Technology: How the Government Tracks Cellular Devices” Online http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/stingray-technology-government-tracks-cellular-devices/)

StingRay technology raises serious privacy concerns because of the indiscriminate way it targets cellular devices in a specific area. The dragnet way in which StingRay operates appears to be in contrast with the principle of various laws worldwide. Government and law enforcement shouldn’t be able to access citizen’s private information without proving to a court order that must be issued to support investigation activities.In the US, for example, the Fourth Amendment stands for the basic principle that the US government cannot conduct a massive surveillance operation, also indicated as “general searches”. The Supreme Court recently reiterated that principle in a case involving cell phone surveillance, and confirmed that law enforcement need a warrant to analyze data on the suspect’s cellphone.Organizations for the defense of civil liberties ask governments to provide warrants to use surveillance technologies like StingRay. The warrant still represents a reasonable mechanism for ensuring the right balance between the citizen’s privacy and law enforcement needs.Organizations such as the American Civil Liberties Union and Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC) highlighted the risks related to the indiscriminate collection of a so large amount of cellular data.“I don’t think that these devices should never be used, but at the same time, you should clearly be getting a warrant,” said Alan Butler of EPIC.Unfortunately, cases such as the one disclosed in this post suggest that governments are using StingRay equipment in secrecy. In some cases, a court order is issued for specific activities, but law enforcement arbitrarily extends the use of technology in other contexts that may be menacing to citizens’ privacy.

Stingray surveillance violates Americans’ 4th Amendment privacy rights
Fakhoury 2012 (Hanni Fakhoury for Electronic Frontier Foundation “StingRays: The Biggest Technological Threat to Cell Phone Privacy You Don’t Know About” October 22 Online https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2012/10/stingrays-biggest-unknown-technological-threat-cell-phone-privacy)
Beyond the government's conduct in this specific case, there is an even broader danger in law enforcement using these devices to locate suspects regardless of whether they explain the technology to judges: these devices allow the government to conduct broad searches amounting to “general warrants,” the exact type of search the Fourth Amendment was written to prevent. A Stingray—which could potentially be beamed into all the houses in one neighborhood looking for a particular signal—is the digital version of the pre-Revolutionary war practice of British soldiers going door-to-door, searching Americans’ homes without rationale or suspicion, let alone judicial approval. The Fourth Amendment was enacted to prevent these general fishing expeditions. As the Supreme Court has explained, a warrant requires probable cause for all places searched, and is supposed to detail the scope of the search to ensure “nothing is left to the discretion of the officer executing the warrant”.But if uninformed courts approve the unregulated use of Stingrays, they are essentially allowing the government to enter into the home via a cellular signal at law enforcement’s discretion and rummage at will without any supervision. The government can’t simply use technology to upend centuries of Constitutional law to conduct a search they would be prevented from doing physically.Stingrays Collect Data on Hundreds of Innocent PeopleAnd when police use a Stingray, it’s not just the suspects’ phone information the device sucks up, but all the innocent people around such suspect as well. Some devices have a range of “several kilometers,” meaning potentially thousands of people could have their privacy violated despite not being suspected of any crime.



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