Fourth Amendment Commons^™

The Unreasonable Rise Of Reasonable Suspicion: Terrorist Watchlists And Terry V. Ohio, Jeffrey Kahn

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

Terry v. Ohio’s “reasonable suspicion” test was created in the context of domestic law enforcement, but it did not remain there. This Essay examines the effect of transplanting this test into a new context: the world of terrorist watchlists. In this new context, reasonable suspicion is the standard used to authorize the infringement on liberty that often results from being watchlisted. But nothing else from the case that created that standard remains the same. The government official changes from a local police officer to an anonymous member of the intelligence community. The purpose changes from crime prevention to counterterrorism. …

Private Actors, Corporate Data And National Security: What Assistance Do Tech Companies Owe Law Enforcement?, Caren Morrison

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

When the government investigates a crime, do citizens have a duty to assist? This question was raised in the struggle between Apple and the FBI over whether the agency could compel Apple to defeat its own password protections on the iPhone of one of the San Bernardino shooters. That case was voluntarily dismissed as moot when the government found a way of accessing the data on the phone, but the issue remains unresolved.

Because of advances in technology, software providers and device makers have been able to develop almost impenetrable protection for their customers’ information, effectively locking law enforcement out …

Horizontal Cybersurveillance Through Sentiment Analysis, Margaret Hu

William & Mary Bill of Rights Journal

This Essay describes emerging big data technologies that facilitate horizontal cybersurveillance. Horizontal cybersurveillance makes possible what has been termed as “sentiment analysis.” Sentiment analysis can be described as opinion mining and social movement forecasting. Through sentiment analysis, mass cybersurveillance technologies can be deployed to detect potential terrorism and state conflict, predict protest and civil unrest, and gauge the mood of populations and subpopulations. Horizontal cybersurveillance through sentiment analysis has the likely result of chilling expressive and associational freedoms, while at the same time risking mass data seizures and searches. These programs, therefore, must be assessed as adversely impacting a combination …