SCOTUS Limits Police Geofence Warrant Power
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- The U.S. Supreme Court ruled 6-3 in Chatrie v. United States that geofence warrants are "searches" under the Fourth Amendment, requiring law enforcement to obtain a warrant before compelling location data from tech companies.
- The decision says Americans have "a reasonable expectation of privacy" in their cell phone location data, effectively ending police use of geofence warrants without judicial approval.
- Google and Apple sit at the center of the case, since geofence warrants force these companies to hand over location records for every device present in a specified geographic area during a crime.
- Coverage framed the ruling as a sweeping curtailment of police power, with Ars Technica's headline declaring the decision "guts government's use of geofence warrants."
- Justice Alito publicly ripped the majority, and MS NOW's opinion piece noted the ruling protects privacy "but only to a point"—a caveat flagged by only a handful of outlets in the consensus coverage.
- The Electronic Frontier Foundation declared it a "victory" for constitutional location data protection, while Inc.com headlined the shift as "the era of easy phone tracking is over."
Why it matters: Police can no longer serve geofence warrants on Google and Apple to identify every device present in a crime scene area without judicial sign-off, stripping investigators of a bulk surveillance tool. Google and Apple gain a stronger legal basis to resist law enforcement location requests, reshaping how digital evidence is gathered in criminal cases going forward.
