Re:A World of Surveillance Doesn’t Always Help to Catch a Thief
by logfromblammo on Tuesday December 20, 2016 @11:05AM
(#13221030)
What the FBI (executive) believes is legal and what the courts (judicial) believe is legal will occasionally differ.
Also, if you were to stand on a public right-of-way and photograph an FBI building, you would quickly find that the FBI's beliefs about photography are a bit more nuanced, and a lot more hypocritical.
Usually, the courts take into account the typical movements of actual people when determining the expectation of privacy. If you put up an 8-ft privacy fence around your backyard, and an aerial camera can still see into it from unrestricted public airspace, that doesn't really matter, because you have made the gesture of enclosing a private space. The fence is a request for the public to honor your desire for privacy. Genuine privacy is what you get when the government builds a classified facility. Fences, restricted airspace, guards with guns, and locked windowless rooms. No private person can afford that, so we pretend that a fig leaf is as good as a tuxedo.
Also, if you were to stand on a public right-of-way and photograph an FBI building, you would quickly find that the FBI's beliefs about photography are a bit more nuanced, and a lot more hypocritical.
Usually, the courts take into account the typical movements of actual people when determining the expectation of privacy. If you put up an 8-ft privacy fence around your backyard, and an aerial camera can still see into it from unrestricted public airspace, that doesn't really matter, because you have made the gesture of enclosing a private space. The fence is a request for the public to honor your desire for privacy. Genuine privacy is what you get when the government builds a classified facility. Fences, restricted airspace, guards with guns, and locked windowless rooms. No private person can afford that, so we pretend that a fig leaf is as good as a tuxedo.