Father and son pay dearly for killing grizzly bear amid coverup | Hacker News Reader

Father and son pay dearly for killing grizzly bear amid coverup

ftw.usatoday.com

18 pointstzs16 comments

It should be mentioned that they were caught because law enforcement found the dead bear then got google to give them data on people who had been in the area at the time of death.

> In May, Fish and Game sent a warrant to Google to determine whose electronic devices were in the area at the time of the poaching

I'm surprised there isn't a 4th amendment violation in there. Do we really not have an expectation of not being tracked at all times by law enforcement?

I do have the expectation to not be tracked at all times but tbf they got a warrant.

Right, but its effectively a warrant to go back in time and stake out the area. I mean, maybe it's no different than getting someone's phone records, but it feels like overreach to know such a thing is possible (I already knew it was possible). At minimum it's a good reminder that you're carrying a police tracking device in your pocket all the time, and maybe that's a bad idea

How is this different from asking the neighbours "if they saw anyone last night?"

Who is this theoretical neighbor in the woods?

You're not seeing the forest for the trees. It doesn't have to be a theoretical neighbor, it could just as easily have been reaching out to hikers that might've been in the area. The point is that someone saw they were there, police figured out who that someone was, and they asked them for that information.

According to the article, Google.

But in cases of violence in the woods, it is absolutely normal to contact hikers who had been in the area to ask what they might have seen. How else do you imagine police work to go?

Nope, cell phone companies are required to keep location data for a time (18 months?) in case law enforcement decides they want to subpoena the data later. Google would probably keep the data longer if you have location tracking enabled on your account, because that's a feature. https://myactivity.google.com/activitycontrols?settings=loca...

If you don't want to be tracked 24/7, maybe don't bring a device that reports your location to multiple companies 24/7.

> If you don't want to be tracked 24/7, maybe don't bring a device that reports your location to multiple companies 24/7.

Is that the kind of world you want to have? Why should be have to choose between using technology and having privacy? That seems like the sort of reasonable expectation of privacy that the fourth amendment is supposed to secure, even if it's not explicitly covered

I mean that would be nice, but it's been this way for decades and I guess I'm pretty jaded about it at this point.

But they weren't "tracked at all times by law enforcement". Law enforcement discovered a crime, investigated, solicited information from private entities about the scene, and detected suspects. How is this different from sending a deputy around a neighbourhood asking if "anyone saw a car last night?"

Because this "neighbor" is essentially a mandatory extension of you. It is nigh impossible to completely drop _voluntary_ tracking technology (smartphones, modern cars, etc.) without making extreme sacrifices in utility, social life, and a million other things. Yes, a more technical person could use a FOSS phone without Google, but there's still the phone company to be that helpful "neighbor". At the end of the day, you have no privacy. You are being tracked and monitored 100% of the time, and law enforcement's ability to retroactively get a warrant to invade that privacy is proof of it. The only functional difference between this and state-mandated tracking is that you can look at funny pictures on this government tracker.

Suppose the government were "track[ing] at all times". Would they be actively monitoring every single piece of data coming in and combing through it for any sort of illegal activity? No, they'd be using this data as a tool when they're made aware of a crime.

If this is your fight, you lost it decades ago. The US courts have consistently held that you have no 4th amendment rights to protect records held by an independent party. And any remaining protections were erased in 2001 by Cheney's war on privacy and the NSA dragnet. Remember room 641 -- and also remember that congress retroactively declared it all legal. Maybe you should have privacy rights -- I think so, and the EFF certainly thinks so! But there's certainly no "in the woods" exception to this long-standing practice. Go lobby your congress-critter and change the law!

I'm much more concerned about some of the urban uses of this, where the police ask for details on everyone in a square mile downtown for an evening, and then troll through thousands of names. It is easy to imagine a sequence of coincidences leading to a forced false-confession. But here, where anyone returned would be either a genuine suspect, or possible witness, it just seems like diligent policing. How else would you investigate this crime, or a murder in the woods? - https://www.theguardian.com/world/2020/apr/01/canada-double-...

There is no fight here, there never was. It's been an unfortunate reality since before my parents were born.

This hypothetical applies to innawoods too. Oh, you were the only people with your phones turned on when X happened in the middle of nowhere? It must be you, come on and fumble your words already so we have something to tie you on. Ultimately, the issue with mass surveillance isn't privacy (although I do appreciate privacy myself), the issue is how it empowers corrupt, overzealous, or otherwise idiotic subsets of law enforcement. The Fourth Amendment is not to guarantee your privacy, it's to guarantee your security from corrupt, overzealous, or otherwise idiotic subsets of law enforcement.

I think (and this is heavy arm chairing so maybe good to back up with some due diligence) that Carpenter v. United States made it so this required a warrant. I think if you have a warrant though, Google will give over this kind of info.

[1]. https://harvardlawreview.org/2021/05/geofence-warrants-and-t...

If you think Google complying with a warrant like that is bad, look into the third party doctrine as it pertains to digital records.

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