# Obama wants expanded computer search rules **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 26, 2009, 2:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-wants-expanded-computer-search-rules/518994 "2009-11-26T02:53:50Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 7\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/73ab20/32.png) [@The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tao_s_Revenge)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-wants-expanded-computer-search-rules/518994/21 "2009-11-28T16:28:42Z")
> [@Projammer](#): > > Real computers don’t have the same abilities as the ones on TV either. This is coming from experience. I have done data mining and blending of disparate databases from multiple unrelated applications. Maybe when we develop a true AI, but not today. And yet you’re too incompetent to filter all but ten names from a spreadsheet? It’s a damned spreadsheet. Your bosses must have really loved an employee too grossly incompetent to know basic spreadsheet tasks. 1. Spreadsheet ranges can be converted to tables, if not already a table. 2. then by clicking column header for the names the select all check box can be used to clear all names by clearing it 3. then check the warranted 10 names switching fonts to wing dings or something, or a humble piece of paper can be used to hide the rows while the records are hidden. No high tech voodoo needed. > [@](#): > > Sure, I can filter on j\* smith. I can even create a filter on [Soundex](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soundex) (sounds like) Jon Smith that will catch most, or even all, relevent records. But to have performed due diligence to the task I still have to check all records to make sure one wasn’t missed. So tell me what relevant records using j\*smith would be missed? Also I take it you’d be perfectly fine with the cops going over an entire bank’s databases, including transaction history, of every single customer because they have a warrant for a few customer’s records there? If so why does a right against unwarranted search and seizure have any practical meaning, at all, for the other customers? If not wouldn’t cops need to go over every single customer record for “diligence”? Might miss relevant records otherwise, donchaknow. If you say banking databases are somehow different due to scale, then why why do the other 90 people in the spreadsheet deserve an unwarranted search just because they’re in a smaller database? Also for the OP, wtf does Obama have to do with this? ---
**Author:** ![Digital\_Stimulus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/aeb1de/32.png) [@Digital\_Stimulus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Digital_Stimulus)\ **Post date:** [November 28, 2009, 6:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-wants-expanded-computer-search-rules/518994/22 "2009-11-28T18:09:16Z")
> [@sleestak](#): > > **Digital Stimulus** , I understand cloning the disk for chain of custody reasons. However cloning the disk and searching the whole thing and using everything found on the disk when the warrant was looking for specific data for specific players seems to be going to far. Oh, I agree. My point, which perhaps was not made strongly enough by calling it “_a slightly different question_” was that no matter what, they are going to be able to riffle through the entirety of the disk. What they find may or may not be legally permissible as evidence in court, but they will assuredly still have access to any and all data therein, and it would be naive to not expect them to sift through it. > [@](#): > > The above is from the 9th regarding this case from the link I posted above. It seems reasonable… I agree again. But I assert that, practically speaking, the **only** way to maintain data privacy is unavailability (encryption, since it might be cracked, qualifies only as a quasi-foolproof method). Given that, it is impossible to reconcile the preservation of data integrity (i.e., a whole disk clone) while also enforcing selective data access. Again, this is a slightly different question from the matter of what’s courtroom legal. In post #20, you bring up the notion of privacy invasion – and I agree with what you’re saying. However, taking it to its logical end, to me the fact that a copy of the data exists and resides in law enforcement’s hands renders actual privacy moot. In fact, from a process point of view, it seems to me that in many/most cases determining evidentiary legality will only be possible in retrospect – I can’t imagine many/most computer searches that have specificity akin to “_all spreadsheet rows concerning John Smith in file **steroid\_users.xls** _”. Any such warrant requirements would be trivial to confound on technicalities; yet only slight loosening would expand the search limits to be effectively boundless. Of course, reliance on a third party to perform searches would qualify as a type of “retrospect” in that unrelated data would not be directly accessible by law enforcement – but under any and all scenarios, data privacy (defined in terms of unavailability/inaccessiblity to third parties) is still out the window. ---
**Author:** ![Markxxx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5daacb/32.png) [@Markxxx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Markxxx)\ **Post date:** [November 29, 2009, 6:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-wants-expanded-computer-search-rules/518994/23 "2009-11-29T18:05:18Z")
> [@Dr.Love](#): > > It is my understanding that warrants have to be fairly specific in what investigators are allowed to look for, e.g., if they warrant says to search for illegal drugs, the police aren’t allowed to come back with documents showing tax evasion. Could this turn every warrant into a search for evidence of any illegal activities, whether there is probable cause to suspect them or not? You’re not wrong, but warrents today are mostly meaningless in this regard. Why? This is because cops and judges know the limitations. For instance if a cop is looking for a murder weapon, say a gun, the warrent will say this. Thus the cops can only legally look in places where a weapon may hide. They couldn’t for example look in a ring case, because a gun couldn’t possible fit into a ring case. Everyone knows this, so now when the cops go to a judge to get a warrent, they say they are looking for a gun and associated drugs in powdered form. The cops know darn well there were no drugs involved in the crime. But by specifiying on a warrent very tiny things, the cops thus can look everywhere for a gun. ---
**Author:** ![akennett](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ee59a6/32.png) [@akennett](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/akennett)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2009, 12:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-wants-expanded-computer-search-rules/518994/24 "2009-11-30T00:13:19Z")
> [@The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](#): > > So tell me what relevant records using j\*smith would be missed? Jon S. ---
**Author:** ![Projammer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/projammer/32/559_2.png) [@Projammer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Projammer)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2009, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-wants-expanded-computer-search-rules/518994/25 "2009-11-30T00:45:02Z")
> [@The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](#): > > So tell me what relevant records using j\*smith would be missed? Smith, Jon Open a separate thread in GD if you want to continue this hijack. I’m through with you here. ---
**Author:** ![drachillix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/48db29/32.png) [@drachillix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drachillix)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2009, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-wants-expanded-computer-search-rules/518994/26 "2009-11-30T00:55:36Z")
> [@Leaper](#): > > I’m a little unsure about my stand on this. A Slashdot reader summed up my misgivings best: “Scrolling to the right breaks the Fourth Amendment?” Runs out to start selling very large high resolution monitor arrays to crime labs everywhere to minimize the scrolling. As well as teaching them how to use the zoom features of MS office. ---
**Author:** ![Blake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/a9a28c/32.png) [@Blake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blake)\ **Post date:** [November 30, 2009, 11:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-wants-expanded-computer-search-rules/518994/27 "2009-11-30T11:26:25Z")
IANAL, so can someone who is tell me how this might apply to a non-computer situation? For example, back in the early 90s my work used an archiving service. Basically every 6 months they took all our paper documents, copied them and then stored them. If we wanted them back we had to pay a nominal fee (5c a box or something). So we got to store all our records and data for a minor fee. Presumably the records were stored in a big warehouse somewhere, along with the records of all the other businesses the service contracted to. So lets imagine that archiving service is keeping records for the local Mafia Don, and is suspected of being complicit. The cops get a search warrant for the records of the Mafia Don, entitling them to enter the warehouse and open the archive boxes. Does the original ruling then allow them to open all archive boxes, because the Don’s files might have been deliberately mislabelled, or hidden in amongst someone else’s documents? This seems to be the argument used to support opening all computer files, but would any court allow it to hold up in the analogous real world situation? And what about if they get a warrant to search my Doctor’s files (electronic or otherwise). Are they then allowed to argue that all my medical history is in plain view by virtue of being stored in the same room as the files of a suspected criminal? If this is so it seems like warrants are useless at protecting privacy. If the police can find an excuse to search any collective storage centre they can search the possessions of anybody in that centre. God forbid they get a warrant to search Google’s servers, since that would presumably allow them to search the emails of half a billion people. The whole thing seems very strange when you compare it to apparently identical real world storage “vaults”. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/obama-wants-expanded-computer-search-rules/518994.md?page=1)