Capitol Hill grilling of tech CEOs highlights expansion of 'geofence warrants'
A North Dakota congressman Wednesday challenged a controversial investigative tactic used by law enforcement nationally - including in North Carolina - to demand location data from Google users who appear near the scene of a crime.
Posted — UpdatedThe Raleigh Police Department says it balances constitutional privacy protections by requesting anonymized data in the early stages of the warrant request process, which detectives use only sparingly.
Unless they include specific information identifying a subject, he said, "geowarrants are essentially general warrants."
"I think people would be terrified to know that law enforcement could grab general warrants and get everybody's information anywhere," Armstrong said. "So it requires Congress to act. It requires everybody that is a witness in this hearing to be willing to work too, because it is the single most important issue I think we are going to face."
Pichai didn't answer directly, but noted it was an issue "we deeply care about."
"This is why we issue transparency reports, because we think it's an important area for Congress to have oversight," Pichai said.
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