Case of the Week: Cell Site Data

This week the Fifth Circuit of the United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas handed down an important ruling on the Fourth Amendment. The case in question was a dispute between federal law enforcement and a cell phone service provider. Law enforcement had requested the phone records and service information of a particular cell phone from the phone provider pursuant to the Stored Communications Act but the provider refused to provide the records. The federal magistrate who reviewed the case ruled that the phone provider must give law enforcement the subscriber data but did not compel them to to produce cell site data, ruling that "compelled warrant less disclosure of cell site data violates the Fourth Amendment" (IN RE: APPLICATION OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA FOR HISTORICAL CELL SITE DATA. United States District Court for the Southern District of Texas. 30 July 2013.)