The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is buying commercially available data that can be used to track people’s locations and movement history, Kash Patel, the director of the agency, said at a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on Wednesday (March 18), marking the first time the agency has openly acknowledged the practice is currently ongoing.“We do purchase commercially available information that’s consistent with the Constitution and the laws under the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, and it has led to some valuable intelligence for us,” Patel told senators, as per a news report by The Politico. It is to be noted that in 2023, then-FBI Director Christopher Wray acknowledged that the agency had purchased location data in the past but stated it was not doing tracking people’s movement at the time.
How the FBI gets around warrant requirements
The backdrop to this admission is a legal boundary. Since 2018, the US Supreme Court has required law enforcement agencies to obtain a court warrant before accessing people’s location data from mobile phone providers. Data brokers collect vast amounts of personal information, including location history, and sell it to paying customers. Since, this data is technically “commercially available”, law enforcement agencies can purchase it without needing a warrant to purchase.
Lawmakers push back
The report said that senators Ron Wyden (Democrat, Oregon) and Mike Lee (Republican, Utah) introduced the Government Surveillance Reform Act on March 13, which would require federal law enforcement and intelligence agencies to obtain a warrant before purchasing Americans’ personal data. Wyden was blunt in his criticism at the hearing. He said, “Doing that without a warrant is an outrageous end run around the Fourth Amendment — it’s particularly dangerous given the use of artificial intelligence to comb through massive amounts of private information.”A companion bill has also been introduced in the House by Representatives Zoe Lofgren (Democrat, California) and Warren Davidson (Republican, Ohio).However, not everyone at the hearing was opposed. Committee Chair Tom Cotton (Republican, Arkansas) defended the practice by saying, “The key words are commercially available. If any other person can buy it, and the FBI can buy it, and it helps them locate a depraved child molester or savage cartel leader, I would certainly hope the FBI is doing anything it can to keep Americans safe.”Patel was not the only intelligence official to make a revealing admission at the hearing. Defense Intelligence Agency Director James Adams also confirmed that his agency purchases commercially available information.
