Thread by @bskorup

Big 4th Amendment case from the Colorado Supreme Court, People v. Seymour.

Police obtained suspect's Google search history from Google.

Court: "users own their Google content"—not Google. Police copying the suspect's data was a 4th Amendment "seizure." casetext.com/case/people-v-…

Court says: "Indeed, Google's licensing agreement makes clear that it does not own its users' content. Instead, users own their Google content, which, according to testimony from a Google policy specialist, includes their search histories."

The government's "act of copying that [digital data] meaningfully interferes with the owner's possessory interest because it infringes on one's rights to exclude and to control the dissemination and use of that digital data."

Court holds: "Therefore, law enforcement's copying of Seymour's Google search history meaningfully interfered with his possessory interest in that data and constituted a seizure subject to constitutional protection."

"A trespass is a trespass even if the intruder doesn't know the digital property owner's name. In sum, law enforcement conducted . . . a seizure of that [search history] information under both the Colorado Constitution and the Fourth Amendment."

My summary of the case, at the Federalist Society blog: Digital data is often obtained by law enforcement and this "will change how modern-day investigations into digital data are conducted if other state and federal judges agree." fedsoc.org/scdw/reverse-k…

Outside the Fourth Amendment context, if users own their digital data and tech companies are merely bailees, that raises some new questions when thinking about applying Fifth Amendment takings, conversion, larceny, and trespass to chattels.