The Department of Justice (DOJ) is one step closer to making a controversial change in how judges issue warrants for computer searches.
The department confirmed to multiple news outlets that a United States Courts committee has approved its request to give judges the power to authorize warrants for electronic searches in multiple jurisdictions or when investigators don’t know the physical location of a device.Under the current rules, judges can only grant warrants for their own jurisdictions, with some narrow exceptions.
Tech companies like Google, computer scientists and privacy advocates have decried the potential change, which they believe would give the FBI the authority to hack computers with little oversight.
The move, Google argued in a February blog post, would be “a significant change to procedural rules that could have profound implications for the privacy rights and security interests of everyone who uses the Internet.”
The DOJ has argued the alteration is a minor but necessary update to ease the warrant approval process in the digital age.
They point out that a single computer network can span multiple jurisdictions. Having to get a warrant for each jurisdiction instead of just one warrant for the computer network would hinder investigators, officials say. It’s also increasingly difficult to know the physical location of a digital crook, the FBI argued in its request.
“Criminals are increasingly using sophisticated anonymizing technologies when they engage in crime over the Internet,” the bureau said.
The proposal is still a ways off from being implemented. Both the Supreme Court and Congress must eventually sign off on the change, which would go into effect Dec. 1, 2016, if approved.
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