Prosecutors charge Missouri sheriff with warrantless cellphone tracking

The US company Securus provides a cellphone tracking service that can locate almost any cellphone in the US within seconds by obtaining data from major carriers via a system used by marketers and other companies. In 2018, former Mississippi County, Missouri, sheriff Cory Hutcheson was charged in state and federal courts for using the service to track people's phones, including those of other police officers, without court orders. Securus, which also provides and monitors calls to inmates in thousands of prisons across the country, said that it requires customers to upload a legal document and certify that the tracking is authorised; however, Senator Ron Wyden (D-OR) told the Federal Communications Commission that the company had confirmed to him that it did not review surveillance requests. US judicial rulings to date have been divided on whether investigators need a warrant based on probable cause to obtain location data.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/10/technology/cellphone-tracking-law-enforcement.html

Writer: Jennifer Valentino-DeVries

Publication: New York Times