Law Commons^™

Finding The Foregone Conclusions Of Encryption, Timothy A. Wiseman

Timothy A Wiseman

Encryption is commonly used to protect private information, for both legitimate and illegitimate reasons. Courts have been struggling to determine when, within the bounds of the Fourth and Fifth Amendments, the Courts may compel a defendant in a criminal case to decrypt their data.

This article argues that a broad use of the Forgone Conclusion doctrine would permit the Courts to order a defendant to decrypt their data when the prosecution can show with reasonable particularity the existence and location of the encrypted documents, that they are likely to be incriminating, and that the government can authenticate them without the …

Back To The Future: The Constitution Requires Reasonableness And Particularity—Introducing The “Seize But Don’T Search” Doctrine, Adam Lamparello, Charles E. Maclean

Adam Lamparello

Issuing one-hundred or fewer opinions per year, the United States Supreme Court cannot keep pace with opinions that match technological advancement. As a result, in Riley v. California and United States v. Wurie, the Court needs to announce a broader principle that protects privacy in the digital age. That principle, what we call “seize but don’t search,” recognizes that the constitutional touchstone for all searches is reasonableness.

When do present-day circumstances—the evolution in the Government’s surveillance capabilities, citizens’ phone habits, and the relationship between the NSA and telecom companies—become so thoroughly unlike those considered by the Supreme Court thirty-four years …

Trial By Google: Judicial Notice In The Information Age, Andrew Ferguson

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

This Article presents a theory of judicial notice for the information age. It argues that the ease of accessing factual data on the Internet allows judges and litigants to expand the use of judicial notice in ways that raise significant concerns about admissibility, reliability, and fair process. State and federal courts are already applying the surprisingly pliant judicial notice rules to bring websites ranging from Google Maps to Wikipedia into the courtroom, and these decisions will only increase in frequency in coming years. This rapidly emerging judicial phenomenon is notable for its ad hoc and conclusory nature – attributes that …