美国国家公共电台 NPR--Privacy advocates fear Google will be used to prosecute abortion seekers

Privacy advocates fear Google will be used to prosecute¹ abortion² seekers

Transcript³

When police are trying to solve a crime, they often turn to Google for help.

It makes sense since the Silicon⁴ Valley giant has grown into a nearly $1.6 trillion company on the strength of its most valuable asset: Data on billions of people.

And often, finding out where someone was at the time of a crime, or what they were Googling before a crime occurs, can be pivotal to investigators⁵.

Now that the Supreme⁶ Court has overturned Roe⁷ v. Wade⁸, privacy advocates fear Google will provide users' data to authorities who may try to target people seeking abortions⁹.

When someone uses a Google service on their phone with location history enabled, Google logs that phone's position about every two minutes. The company can estimate the location of a person's device within nine feet, court testimony¹⁰ from the company has shown.

In the first half of last year, law enforcement sent Google more than 50,000 subpoenas¹¹, search warrants and other types of legal requests for data Google retains, sometimes drawing from a massive centralized database of users' location history known as "Sensorvault," which was first reported by the New York Times in 2019.

"Google is increasingly the cornerstone of American policing," said Albert Fox Cahn, a lawyer who is also executive director of the Surveillance Technology Oversight¹² Project, an advocacy group.

As authorities investigating crimes have become more tech savvy¹³, they have turned to two particularly controversial types of data requests: geofence warrants and keyword warrants.

Geofence and keyword warrants are digital dragnets

Geofence warrants seek information about every device that has crossed into a defined location in a specific period of time, say a bank at which there was recently a robbery, a home that was recently burned down, or an abortion clinic following the Supreme Court ruling.

Keyword warrants request information on everyone who has Googled specific search terms, a kind of digital dragnet that has long alarmed privacy advocates, and now abortion-rights advocates as well.

"It is so chilling. It is so broad. It is so contrary to our civil rights. And yet, because Google has so much of our data, it's just a ticking time bomb for pregnant people," Cahn said of keyword searches.

While it remains¹⁴ unclear whether state authorities will try to prosecute abortion-seekers, and will use digital evidence as part of those potential cases, legal experts say the prospect¹⁵ should be taken seriously.

Privacy experts like Cahn consider the keyword search warrants — being able to comb through everyone who Googled a certain term — a type of fishing expedition that violates user privacy.

"This is the equivalent of going to a library and then trying to search every person who checked out a specific book," he added. "We would never allow that in the analog¹⁶ world."

Such a far-reaching search in the real world would likely violate the Fourth Amendment's ban on unreasonable¹⁷ searches, Cahn said. But courts are still catching¹⁸ up to the technology.

Geofence and keyword warrants are largely untested in U.S. courts

There are very few cases in the U.S. that have tested the legality of geofence warrants.

In a Virginia bank robbery case, a federal judge ruled this year that the use of the geofenced data to catch a suspect was unconstitutional since police did not demonstrate they had probable cause for the search and it provided authorities with the location data of innocent bystanders. The warrant was approved by a magistrate¹⁹ who did not have a law degree. Yet the judge's ruling in the case does not have any bearing on how authorities in other states use the warrants.

Similarly, keyword searches are a relatively²⁰ novel concept in the American legal system.

In Denver, police used a keyword search to find a suspect in a fire that left five dead. Authorities obtained from Google the names of people who had searched for the address of the home that was set ablaze²¹ and made an arrest.

The privacy watchdog group Electronic Frontier Foundation says keyword warrants are "totally incompatible²² with constitutional protections for privacy and freedom of speech and expression."

Jennifer Lynch, a lawyer with the group, said such searches run the risk of implicating²³ innocent people.

Since the U.S. does not have a national data privacy law that could ban this type of surveillance, the cases are playing out in courts around the country in scattershot fashion.

"It's still a relatively new search technique, and we're just now seeing judges deal with them," she said.

Police and prosecutors²⁴, however, view geofence and keyword warrants as a way to catch perpetrators of crimes who may have otherwise eluded²⁵ authorities.

Google's own workers want the company to do more to protect abortion-seekers

Google has said that if data requests from authorities are overly broad, it will challenge them. The company's own statistics show that it produces data for authorities about 80% of the time it receives requests. There is no public evidence of the company resisting a keyword search warrant in the U.S. It did, however, push back on one in Brazil.

Google earlier this month committed to deleting location data that shows when people go to abortion providers, fertility centers and other "particularly personal" places. In a blog post, Google executive Jen Fitzpatrick wrote that users can also choose to have their location data auto-deleted from their devices.

Some Google employees are agitating²⁶ for the company to do more.

"They're really looking for these short, punchy press releases that get this breathless, 'Wow, Google is doing such good things,' or 'Alphabet is doing such good things,' coverage²⁷ in the tech media, but then really aren't actually substantial," said Ashok Chandwaney, a Google software engineer who is part of the Alphabet Workers' Union. (Alphabet is Google's parent company.)

Chandwaney wants Google to vow²⁸ to figure out all the ways law enforcement can potentially gather data on abortion-seekers from the company.

"And then make it so that the data that could get people charged, or fined, or thrown in jail, or whatever, for seeking out healthcare, is not a thing that the company has to give to law enforcement," he said.

Shannon Bond contributed to this report.

1 prosecute   

vt.告发；进行；vi.告发，起诉，作检察官

参考例句：

• I am trying my best to prosecute my duties.我正在尽力履行我的职责。
• Is there enough evidence to prosecute?有没有起诉的足够证据？

2 abortion   

n.流产，堕胎

参考例句：

• She had an abortion at the women's health clinic.她在妇女保健医院做了流产手术。
• A number of considerations have led her to have a wilful abortion.多种考虑使她执意堕胎。

3 transcript   

n.抄本，誊本，副本，肄业证书

参考例句：

• A transcript of the tapes was presented as evidence in court.一份录音带的文字本作为证据被呈交法庭。
• They wouldn't let me have a transcript of the interview.他们拒绝给我一份采访的文字整理稿。

4 silicon   

n.硅(旧名矽)

参考例句：

• This company pioneered the use of silicon chip.这家公司开创了使用硅片的方法。
• A chip is a piece of silicon about the size of a postage stamp.芯片就是一枚邮票大小的硅片。

5 investigators   

n.调查者，审查者( investigator的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• This memo could be the smoking gun that investigators have been looking for. 这份备忘录可能是调查人员一直在寻找的证据。
• The team consisted of six investigators and two secretaries. 这个团队由六个调查人员和两个秘书组成。 来自《简明英汉词典》

6 supreme   

adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的

参考例句：

• It was the supreme moment in his life.那是他一生中最重要的时刻。
• He handed up the indictment to the supreme court.他把起诉书送交最高法院。

7 roe   

n.鱼卵；獐鹿

参考例句：

• We will serve smoked cod's roe at the dinner.宴会上我们将上一道熏鳕鱼子。
• I'll scramble some eggs with roe?我用鱼籽炒几个鸡蛋好吗？

8 wade   

v.跋涉，涉水；n.跋涉

参考例句：

• We had to wade through the river to the opposite bank.我们只好涉水过河到对岸。
• We cannot but wade across the river.我们只好趟水过去。

9 abortions   

n.小产( abortion的名词复数 )；小产胎儿；（计划）等中止或夭折；败育

参考例句：

• The Venerable Master: By not having abortions, by not killing living beings. 上人：不堕胎、不杀生。 来自互联网
• Conclusion Chromosome abnormality is one of the causes of spontaneous abortions. 结论：染色体异常是导致反复自然流产的原因之一。 来自互联网

10 testimony   

n.证词；见证，证明

参考例句：

• The testimony given by him is dubious.他所作的证据是可疑的。
• He was called in to bear testimony to what the police officer said.他被传入为警官所说的话作证。

11 subpoenas   

n.（传唤出庭的）传票( subpoena的名词复数 )v.（用传票）传唤（某人）( subpoena的第三人称单数 )

参考例句：

• My company has complied with committee subpoenas by supplying documents confirming all that I have said. 本公司按照委员会的要求，提供了能够证实我刚才发言的文件。 来自辞典例句
• Congressional Investigations: Subpoenas and Contempt Power. Report for Congress April 2, 2003. 金灿荣：《美国国会的监督功能》，载《教学与研究》2003年第2期。 来自互联网

12 oversight   

n.勘漏，失察，疏忽

参考例句：

• I consider this a gross oversight on your part.我把这件事看作是你的一大疏忽。
• Your essay was not marked through an oversight on my part.由于我的疏忽你的文章没有打分。

13 savvy   

v.知道，了解；n.理解能力，机智，悟性；adj.有见识的，懂实际知识的，通情达理的

参考例句：

• She was a pretty savvy woman.她是个见过世面的漂亮女人。
• Where's your savvy?你的常识到哪里去了？

14 remains   

n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹

参考例句：

• He ate the remains of food hungrily.他狼吞虎咽地吃剩余的食物。
• The remains of the meal were fed to the dog.残羹剩饭喂狗了。

15 prospect   

n.前景，前途；景色，视野

参考例句：

• This state of things holds out a cheerful prospect.事态呈现出可喜的前景。
• The prospect became more evident.前景变得更加明朗了。

16 analog   

n.类似物，模拟

参考例句：

• The analog signal contains high-frequency video information,which helps make up the picture.模拟信号包括有助于构成图像的高频视频信息。
• The analog computer measures continuously,without proceeding step by step.模拟计算机不是一步一步地进行，而是连续地进行量度。

17 unreasonable   

adj.不讲道理的，不合情理的，过度的

参考例句：

• I know that they made the most unreasonable demands on you.我知道他们对你提出了最不合理的要求。
• They spend an unreasonable amount of money on clothes.他们花在衣服上的钱太多了。

18 catching   

adj.易传染的，有魅力的，迷人的，接住

参考例句：

• There are those who think eczema is catching.有人就是认为湿疹会传染。
• Enthusiasm is very catching.热情非常富有感染力。

19 magistrate   

n.地方行政官，地方法官，治安官

参考例句：

• The magistrate committed him to prison for a month.法官判处他一个月监禁。
• John was fined 1000 dollars by the magistrate.约翰被地方法官罚款1000美元。

20 relatively   

adv.比较...地，相对地

参考例句：

• The rabbit is a relatively recent introduction in Australia.兔子是相对较新引入澳大利亚的物种。
• The operation was relatively painless.手术相对来说不痛。

21 ablaze   

adj.着火的，燃烧的；闪耀的，灯火辉煌的

参考例句：

• The main street was ablaze with lights in the evening.晚上，那条主要街道灯火辉煌。
• Forests are sometimes set ablaze by lightning.森林有时因雷击而起火。

22 incompatible   

adj.不相容的，不协调的，不相配的

参考例句：

• His plan is incompatible with my intent.他的计划与我的意图不相符。
• Speed and safety are not necessarily incompatible.速度和安全未必不相容。

23 implicating   

vt.牵涉，涉及（implicate的现在分词形式）

参考例句：

• He was in the public dock, confessing everything, implicating everybody. 他站在被告席上，什么都招认，什么人都咬。 来自英汉文学
• No one would have had me get out of the scrape by implicating an old friend. 无论什么人都不能叫我为了自己摆脱困难便把一个老朋友牵累到这案子里去。 来自辞典例句

24 prosecutors   

检举人( prosecutor的名词复数 )； 告发人； 起诉人； 公诉人

参考例句：

• In some places,public prosecutors are elected rather than appointed. 在有些地方，检察官是经选举而非任命产生的。 来自口语例句
• You've been summoned to the Prosecutors' Office, 2 days later. 你在两天以后被宣到了检察官的办公室。

25 eluded   

v.（尤指机敏地）避开( elude的过去式和过去分词 )；逃避；躲避；使达不到

参考例句：

• The sly fox nimbly eluded the dogs. 那只狡猾的狐狸灵活地躲避开那群狗。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
• The criminal eluded the police. 那个罪犯甩掉了警察的追捕。 来自《现代英汉综合大词典》

26 agitating   

搅动( agitate的现在分词 )； 激怒； 使焦虑不安； （尤指为法律、社会状况的改变而）激烈争论

参考例句：

• political groups agitating for social change 鼓吹社会变革的政治团体
• They are agitating to assert autonomy. 他们正在鼓吹实行自治。

27 coverage   

n.报导，保险范围，保险额，范围，覆盖

参考例句：

• There's little coverage of foreign news in the newspaper.报纸上几乎没有国外新闻报道。
• This is an insurance policy with extensive coverage.这是一项承保范围广泛的保险。

28 vow   

n.誓(言)，誓约；v.起誓，立誓

参考例句：

• My parents are under a vow to go to church every Sunday.我父母许愿，每星期日都去做礼拜。
• I am under a vow to drink no wine.我已立誓戒酒。