The result is a detailed history, including time information, of the device’s location and, hence, the vehicle’s location. While Sveum’s car was in his driveway, police secretly attached the device to the underside of his car with a magnet and tape. The police tracked Sveum’s car with the device for about five weeks. During this time, Sveum parked his car in his enclosed garage and inside a garage at his place of employment, a car care center.
We agree with the State that neither a search nor a seizure occurs when the police use a GPS device to track a vehicle while it is visible to the general public. The seminal cases on this topic are United States v. Knotts, 460 U.S. 276 (1983), and United States v. Karo, 468 U.S. 705 (1984).
By contrast, in People v. Weaver, the New York Court of Appeals held that using a GPS device to track movements without a warrant does violate the New York State Constitution:
It would appear clear to us that the great popularity of GPS technology for its many useful applications, may not be taken simply as a massive, undifferentiated concession of personal privacy to agents of the state. Indeed, contemporary technology projects our private activities into public space as never before. Cell technology has moved presumptively private phone conversation from the enclosure of Katz's phone booth to the open sidewalk and the car, and the advent of portable computing devices has re-situated transactions of all kinds to relatively public spaces. It is fair to say, and we think consistent with prevalent social views, that this change in venue has not been accompanied by any dramatic diminution in the socially reasonable expectation that our communications and transactions will remain to a large extent private.
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