# Justices rule that cellphone location histories are protected by the Fourth Amendment **URL:** https://discuss.privacyguides.net/t/justices-rule-that-cellphone-location-histories-are-protected-by-the-fourth-amendment/38879 **Category:** News **Tags:** article **Created:** 2026-06-29T19:38:38Z **Posts:** 19 ## Post 1 by @Carey — 2026-06-29T19:38:38Z > **[Justices rule that cellphone location histories are protected by the Fourth...](https://therecord.media/supreme-court-geofencing-ruling-fourth-amendment)** > > Police must get a warrant to request geofence data involving individual cellphones, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in what represents a victory for privacy advocates. --- ## Post 2 by @byesun — 2026-06-30T00:11:14Z > **[Chatrie v. United States (25-112)](https://www.scotusblog.com/cases/chatrie-v-united-states/)** > > Police officers conducted a Fourth Amendment search when they acquired Okello Chatrie’s location data from Google because an individual has a reasonable expectation of privacy in his cellphone locati… This is the case it seems. Looked it up because I wanted to see who dissented. --- ## Post 3 by @Quantum — 2026-06-30T02:20:34Z I’m going to bet you were 0% surprised by the dissenters lol. Overall this is fantastic news and does a lot of what the legislation that Naomi Brockwell and Rep Massie are championing. --- ## Post 4 by @byesun — 2026-06-30T02:34:24Z Yeah, it was pretty much exactly who I was expecting. --- ## Post 5 by @sleepytejana — 2026-06-30T02:50:06Z Requires a warrant now — okay, great, but in jurisdictions where judges are hostile to privacy, may not do much. A step in the right direction at least. --- ## Post 6 by @notwithstanding — 2026-06-30T13:48:35Z Good to see, overall. The Supreme Court’s eclectic nature when it comes to rulings is quite confusing. One week we get something tantamount to “the President can’t be prosecuted for anything, ever”, and another week we get this. --- ## Post 7 by @Quantum — 2026-06-30T16:40:12Z It seems that there is not really a partisan split in the court as traditionally understood. Instead there is a three way ideological split. A liberal block, a traditional conservative block, and a strict originalist block. The originalist block will sometimes side with the liberals and sometimes with the conservatives. This causing the (from a traditional partisan filter) the eclectic rulings. --- ## Post 8 by @notwithstanding — 2026-06-30T17:00:03Z That’s a really interesting perspective. Can you define what you mean by “originalist”? --- ## Post 10 by @phnx — 2026-06-30T18:12:40Z [Originalism - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Originalism) to give a more helpful answer. --- ## Post 11 by @GolCor — 2026-07-01T12:19:45Z Here is a link to the actual opinions: > **[25-112_0am4.pdf](https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/25pdf/25-112_0am4.pdf)** > > 352.42 KB I’ve only skimmed through because it’s 72 pages and I’m supposed to be working. Overall, I like Gorsuch’s concurrence best, which primarily disagrees with previous rulings that we have no reasonable expectation of privacy for documents shared with third parties. He then argues that digital information qualifies as the “papers and effects” portion of the fourth amendment, and that constitutional protections do not diminish with the advancement of technology. The dissenters argue that cell phone location data was freely and knowingly shared with Google as a third party, so that information is no longer Chatrie’s private data, but is instead a business asset belonging to Google. --- ## Post 12 by @anonymous647 — 2026-07-04T02:50:26Z > [@GolCor](#): > > He then argues that digital information qualifies as the “papers and effects” portion of the fourth amendment, and that constitutional protections do not diminish with the advancement of technology. The law is catching up with common sense, it seems! --- ## Post 13 by @Quantum — 2026-07-04T03:11:07Z I like your optimism. Though I think it’s more likely this is a broken clock being right twice a day. --- ## Post 14 by @Consuming8878 — 2026-07-04T10:47:41Z Your comment is so missleading and false. The US Supreme Court has not ruled that the President (or former President) can never be prosecuted for anything. The Court recognized limited presidential immunity from criminal prosecution for certain official acts while in office, but explicitly rejected absolute or total immunity. --- ## Post 16 by @notwithstanding — 2026-07-04T17:37:49Z _Discourse put my first draft of this post in a Math block which kept crashing the post when I opened, so hopefully that doesn’t happen to this one._ I will try to be charitable, but this topic is a sore spot for me (it was a monumental mistake of a ruling), so I apologize if my response comes across negatively. Here’s an excerpt from the [Wikipedia page](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_v._United_States): > _ **Trump v. United States** _, 603 U.S. 593 (2024), is a [landmark](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_landmark_court_decisions_in_the_United_States "List of landmark court decisions in the United States") decision[[1]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_v._United_States#cite_note-PBSJacobson-1)[[2]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_v._United_States#cite_note-PBSBarajas-2) of the [Supreme Court of the United States](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supreme_Court_of_the_United_States "Supreme Court of the United States") in which the Court determined that [presidential immunity](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Presidential_immunity_in_the_United_States "Presidential immunity in the United States") from criminal prosecution [presumptively](https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/presumptive "wiktionary:presumptive") extends to all of a president’s “official acts” – with [absolute immunity](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absolute_immunity "Absolute immunity") for official acts within an exclusive presidential authority that [Congress](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Congress "United States Congress") cannot regulate[[1]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_v._United_States#cite_note-PBSJacobson-1)[[2]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_v._United_States#cite_note-PBSBarajas-2) such as the pardon, command of the military, execution of laws, or control of the executive branch. > > On July 1, 2024, the Court ruled in a 6–3 decision that presidents have absolute immunity for acts committed as president within their core constitutional purview, at least presumptive immunity for official acts within the outer perimeter of their official responsibility, and no immunity for unofficial acts.[[5]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_v._United_States#cite_note-ruling-5)[[6]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_v._United_States#cite_note-6)[[7]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_v._United_States#cite_note-nythighlights-7)[[8]](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trump_v._United_States#cite_note-8) **The court declined to rule on the scope of immunity for some acts alleged of Trump in his indictment** (latter emphasis mine) This, to me, does not read as _limited_. Because of the Court’s failure to _fully define the **brand new** terms they used_ (what I emphasized), whether the President has immunity or not must now be decided on a case-by-case basis. This means that the Supreme Court can effectively cherry-pick what the President is and is not immune from, using whatever logic they are able to agree on in whatever the fuck “core constitutional purview” or the “outer perimeter of their official responsibility” means. To be clear, I am upset with the decision (it is deeply troubling), and not with your comment on my aforementioned summarized recounting of it. Even aside from the assenting Justices’ inability to define the new legal standards they fabricated, it is troubling. The ruling means that, so long as the President is executing orders from within their purview, they _cannot be criminally indicted_. This is more concisely expanded on by the dissenting Justice Sotomayor (joined in separate opinions by Justices Kagan and Jackson): > When he uses his official powers in any way, under the majority’s reasoning, he now will be insulated from criminal prosecution. Orders the Navy’s Seal Team 6 to assassinate a political rival? Immune. Organizes a military coup to hold onto power? Immune. Takes a bribe in exchange for a pardon? Immune. Immune, immune, immune. > > Let the President violate the law, let him exploit the trappings of his office for personal gain, let him use his official power for evil ends. Because if he knew that he may one day face liability for breaking the law, he might not be as bold and fearless as we would like him to be. That is the majority’s message today. > > Even if these nightmare scenarios never play out, and I pray they never do, the damage has been done. The relationship between the President and the people he serves has shifted irrevocably. In every use of official power, the President is now a king above the law. The source of this quote from Justice Sotomayor can be found [in this document from the Supreme Court’s government website](https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/23pdf/23-939_e2pg.pdf), roughly 4/5th of the way down, on pages 29 and 30 of Justice Sotomayor’s dissent. I hope this has explained why I described the decision in the way that I did, and thanks for your response (and opportunity to expand on it). --- ## Post 19 by @GolCor — 2026-07-06T11:10:05Z Heh - I would like to hope so. But I’m not going to hold my breath on that one! :rofl: