As our online activities become increasingly integrated into our daily lives, we leave ever expanding trails of information about ourselves in the hands of internet companies. The ACLU has fought and continues to fight the aggressive attempts of government law enforcement agencies to subpoena this private data. Now, corporations are getting in on the act. In a civil lawsuit related to its sprawling legal battle against a $19 billion Ecuadorian judgment and the plaintiffs’ lawyer who won it, it was recently revealed that Chevron issued subpoenas to Google, Yahoo, and Microsoft for information on 101 separate email accounts.
The oil giant’s subpoenas instruct the companies to turn over nine years’ worth of identifying and usage information related to the accounts at issue—including the account holders’ names, addresses, phone numbers, billing information, and IP logs (which can show geographic location). Although seemingly innocuous, this information has the potential to reveal all sorts of insights into a person’s private life. Knowing that an e-mail was sent from a church, an abortion clinic, or the headquarters of a gay rights organization can reveal something important about the person who sent it.
One of the account holders targeted by Chevron was Dr. Kevin Jon Heller, a senior lecturer at the Melbourne Law School and international law blogger for Opinio Juris. Although he is a prominent critic of Chevron’s activities in the Ecuador case, he has no substantive connection to the actual litigation. As he describes , he first learned of the subpoena when Google’s legal department sent him an email notifying him of the demand, informing him that he would have to provide a formal legal objection within a few weeks 5 if he wanted to stop his information from being released.
The ACLU agreed to represent Dr. Heller in connection with the subpoena, and contacted Chevron’s lawyers to find out why they were seeking his private information. Despite several phone calls with Chevron’s attorneys, we never got an answer. Instead, Chevron withdrew its demand for Dr. Heller’s information entirely. And so his adventure ended as abruptly – and as mysteriously – as it began.
Chevron’s spokesman, Kent Robertson, that the company’s lawyers issued the subpoenas to figure out whether the designated accounts belong to key participants in the dispute. But that neither explains nor justifies Chevron’s demand for nine years’ worth of private account information on dozens of people, some of whom lack any apparent connection to the litigation. At best, Chevron’s lawyers went on a fishing expedition – at worst, they engaged in a calculated effort to intimidate the company’s adversaries. Either way, this case illustrates the need for clear rules to protect our digital privacy.
Learn more about online privacy: Sign up for breaking news alerts, , and .
Learn More About the Issues on This Page
-
Press ReleaseDec 2024
Privacy & Technology
ACLU Applauds Arizona Supreme Court Historic Decision That Police Need a Warrant to Access DNAACLU Applauds Arizona Supreme Court Historic Decision That Police Need a Warrant to Access DNA
PHOENIX — In a 7-0 decision, the Arizona Supreme Court ruled that a warrant is required to extract and analyze people’s DNA, saying that a person’s limited consent to a search of biological material for a specific purpose—in this case, a blood alcohol test for a DUI arrest—does not overcome that requirement. The ACLU and the ACLU of Arizona filed a friend-of-the-court brief in State v. Mitcham, arguing the government cannot genetically test biological material it already has in its possession—whether that’s blood taken from newborns to test for diseases or swabs collected from sexual assault survivors—to investigate the donors for a crime without first obtaining a warrant. In the decision, the court wrote that “in reaching this conclusion, we emphatically reject the State’s position that it was free to analyze Mitcham’s blood in any way it pleased simply because the State lawfully possessed the blood vials.” “Government analysis of our DNA can expose detailed information about our identity, appearance, family relationships, medical conditions, and more. We don’t consent to sharing all of that information each time we involuntarily shed our DNA or consent to a blood draw. The government’s argument in this case was a privacy nightmare,” said Vera Eidelman, staff attorney with the ACLU’s Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project. “We are greatly heartened by the Arizona Supreme Court’s decision to preserve the privacy of our sensitive genetic information.” In 2015, during a DUI arrest, the defendant in this case consented to the government collecting a sample of his blood solely to test it for blood-alcohol content, and was advised that the sample would be destroyed after 90 days. Instead, law enforcement held on to this sample for three years, at which point it used it for a completely different purpose—to extract and analyze his DNA, without a warrant or consent—while investigating another crime. Had the court accepted the government’s rationale here, all of us who consent to a biological sample collection, at any point in time, for any purpose, to any government entity, could have been subject to a warrantless DNA search after the fact. “Our DNA can reveal so much about us that our genetic privacy must be protected,” said Jared Keenan, legal director of ACLU of Arizona. “The Court’s decision is vital to protecting the strong constitutional rights that keep all Arizonans’ information safe from warrantless searches and unconstitutional intrusion.” -
News & CommentaryDec 2024
Privacy & Technology
Face Recognition Threatens to Replace Tickets, ID at Sports Events – and BeyondFace Recognition Threatens to Replace Tickets, ID at Sports Events – and Beyond
You shouldn't participate in face recognition ticketing schemes. -
MississippiJul 2024
Free Speech
Privacy & Technology
NetChoice v. FitchNetChoice v. Fitch
Whether a law that mandates age verification for all users of social media services violates the First Amendment. -
News & CommentaryDec 2024
Privacy & Technology
AI Generated Police Reports Raise Concerns Around Transparency, BiasAI Generated Police Reports Raise Concerns Around Transparency, Bias
AI-generated police reports threaten to exacerbate existing problems in law enforcement, and to create new ones.