Isn’t it great that when your car, or phone, or laptop gets lost or stolen, you can use modern technology to find your stuff and get it back? One might think only paranoid Luddites or the thieves themselves would oppose such an innovation. But the joy of a ubiquitous communications/tracking network is tempered by the threat to privacy — and potential liability — for enlisting SkyNet to peer into our cars, purses and bedrooms.
Part One: The Wiretap Act and Find My Computer
Last month, in Clements-Jeffrey v. Springfield , a quirky case involving sex and a stolen laptop, a U.S. District Court judge in Ohio ruled that a laptop-tracking company could be liable for intercepting sexually explicit communications in an effort to identify thieves who stole the computer one plaintiff was using to communicate with the other.
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