How Cops Track Your Phone


Wherever you roam, you don't roam alone. Cell phones are easily and frequently tracked to perform services for their owners. But outside parties may also take an interest in where phones—or, more specifically, their owners—go. Among them are law enforcement personnel of all levels who, in many cases, don't need so much as the permission of a governing authority to do the tracking.

Last week, Senator Al Franken asked Attorney General Eric Holder in an open letter to make public how frequently the Department of Justice requests the locations of individuals from wireless carriers without a warrant, how often the carriers comply, what specific information is requested, and the cost of the information.

If that seems like intelligence that would be readily and freely accessible to Congress because of a rule of law, it's not. And the Department of Justice isn't alone in operating outside strictures when it comes to cell phone tracking. Even the smallest of municipalities are, by and large, fashioning their own rules in states that don't specifically prohibit warrantless cell phone tracking.

The problem stems from communications laws that go back to the days of the telegraph and the diversity of court rulings that result from their interpretation.