Justice Department challenges ruling on GPS use - Washington Times

The debate over warrantless GPS monitoring continues. (See previous posts here). The latest news? The Department of Justice has filed a Petition of Certiorari asking the United States Supreme Court to review the ruling of the Court of Appeals in Maynard v. United States. The U.S. Court of Appeals for D.C. in the Tenth Circuit held police can’t use global positioning satellite (GPS) technology to track a suspect’s car without getting a warrant. The full court, in a 5-4 decision last fall, refused to reconsider the decision. Now, the Justice Department is requesting that the Supreme Court accept Certiorari. The Court of Appeals expressed a distinction between a person "exposing" themselves in public on roadways, and police tracking that reveals all the places a person may travel over the course of a month:

In the August 6, 2010 decision, Judge Douglas Ginsburg wrote, "It is one thing for a passerby to observe or even follow someone during a single journey, . . . it is another thing for a stranger to [dog] his prey until he has identified all the places, people, amusements, and chores
that make up that person‘s hitherto private routine.”

The Justice Department now requests that this be considered by the Supreme Court:

“Prompt resolution of this conflict is critically important to law enforcement efforts throughout the United States,” government attorneys argued in their petition. “The court of appeals’ decision seriously impedes the governments’ use of GPS devices at the beginning stages of an investigation when officers are gathering evidence …”

Attorneys for Jones, who remains in prison, argued that federal authorities violated Jones‘ reasonable expectation of privacy under the Fourth Amendment when they used a GPS device to track his movements.

“This is an issue over which a philosophically diverse appellate panel and a majority of the full court agreed,” Stephen C. Leckar, Jones‘ appeals attorney, said after the Justice Department filing.

“The public has a constitutional right that a neutral magistrate will decide in advance whether the police can secretly install in your car an extraordinarily intrusive device that will record relentlessly every seven to 10 seconds where you’ve traveled for over a month,” Mr. Leckar said. “To allow anything less would encourage further erosion of the Fourth Amendment, whose purpose was to curb such abuses of power.”

The issue is heating up elsewhere in the Supreme Court where a Petition was filed by the defendant challenging a Ninth Circuit ruling in United States v. Pineda-Moreno where the Ninth Circuit held that such a GPS tracking did not violate the Fourth Amendment. The Ninth Circuit Court ruled that such a track was not a search. The Ninth Circuit was asked to consider the case en banc and Judge Kozinski wrote an eloquent dissent, available here Circuit Court order denying en banc review, together with a vigorous dissent, is here.. The Supreme Court case, is filed under Pineda-Moreno v. United States, docket 10-7515. [petition available here].
Additional reporting available at Washington Post here or Inside GNSS here.
Stay tuned and keep preserving the issue of the GPS tracking in motions and investigation work.

How to Check Your Cell Phone for Bugs

British information security experts MWR InfoSecurity uncovered a flaw in the Palm Pre which allows for the bugging of conversations "anywhere in the world" while a general flaw in Android allows for the nicking of user passwords through the internet connection. Full article here.

Worried your cell phone might be bugged? Here is a step by step guide on how to debug it. A few simple tips to avoid cell phone bugging: don't allow people to use your phone, bugging apps can be downloaded in seconds, and don't allow leave your phone unattended-the SIM card can be switched out in seconds with a card that will allow listening in.

Now Hear This: Book Review

From this awesome blog I found called Kevin's Security Scrapbook, I found a cool book that looks like a must read:
"Now Hear This!" by Winston Arrington - Available again!
Now Hear This! Electronic Eavesdropping Equipment Designs by Winston Arrington - Sheffield Electronics - 1997 (NOS)
(Click pictures to enlarge.)
Winston Arrington's electronic eavesdropping and countersurveillance design book is available again.

A portion of the review by Kevin (full post here):

Technically excellent, with some very unusual designs, it contains about 125 schematics; all may be built with a moderate level of experience. There is also a (now dated) countermeasures section which was contributed by me.

This book was never easy to purchase. The first printing had to be ordered directly from Winston, himself. This revised and expanded second edition was only sold briefly via the now shuttered Sheffield Electronics website. And, once in a looong while, a used dog-eared copy would show up on eBay to quickly sell in the $50.-$75. range. None have appeared there recently, however.

The picture of Winston's signature is from my copy of the book. Sadly, Winston is no longer with us to sign more of them.