Mobile Phone Tracking Scrutinized By Nikki Swartz Summary

I Know Your Twenty Cell phones have become the leading source of communication in the world. However, it is not just phone calls or e-mails anymore, someone might take down time to play angry birds or candy crush saga. If your cell phone is left on and completely unattended someone, knows your location. Over 200 million Americans who own a cell phone have been watched on a data base created by the cell phone company, keeping track of tower signals, recording conversations, and making copies of text messages and emails. Even the United States government has gone to the extent to using cell phone information when coming to court evidence and alibies. Parents are becoming technologically aware and are using tracking abilities to keep an eye on their children and their whereabouts. The question remains, where can you draw the line between
The article Swartz wrote pointed out to many people that phone companies can track one’s cell phone by tower signals. Swartz also alerted citizens that the government could use similar methods to secretly monitor movements of suspects. The main idea of Swartz’s essay is that the prosecutors have not been successful in accessing court approval to gain evidence against suspects. Swartz quotes, “Prosecutors argue that having such data is crucial to finding suspects, corroborating their whereabouts with witness accounts, or helping build a case for a wiretap on the phone” (302). In the last paragraph of Swartz’s article she soothes people’s conscience by quoting, “[T]he stream of data that carries a telephone conversation or an e-mail message contains a great deal of information, including when and where the communications originated. And that makes it harder for courts to determine whether a certain digital surveillance method invokes Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable searches”