Chatrie v. United States · ¶62
And there is yet a deeper problem: The Government’s app-by-app, feature-by-feature method of granting Fourth Amendment protection misapprehends the very nature of modern cell-phone use. Pretty much everything a person does on a smartphone requires some kind of opt-in—an “affirmative act” beyond “powering up” to utilize a given app or service. Carpenter, 585 U. S., at 315. Consider sending an email on Gmail, uploading a photo to Google Photos, or adding a calendar entry to Google Calendar. None happens solely by dint of the phone’s operation; each requires, as Location History does, an “optional add-on.” Brief for United States 13. And each activity, like using Location History, results in sharing information with a third-party tech company—turning over private materials to live on that company’s servers. The Government wishes to disconnect all those uses from the mere act of carrying a…Read in context ›
slip opinion
Source edition
Passage preview. Read in context for the complete text, notes and references.