Theaters On Prescreenings: Bring Your Firearms, But No Mobile Phones

from the priorities,-people! dept

For many years, we've heard various stories of how anyone who attends an early movie screening (i.e., before the movie has actually been widely released), should expect to be treated like a total criminal. The usual stories involve being searched carefully and being required to hand over all mobile phones, which will be held until the end of the film. Reader minerat writes in to tell us of his story, which involved going to a 7:30pm showing of Moneyball last week -- just a few hours before the movie was actually being released. Even so... same process. "Security made everyone give up their cell phones and checked all bags." And, it appears that security had their priorities straight from the MPAA:

The better part is after we gave up our phones, another security guard waves a metal detecting wand over us and we had to empty our pockets on any hits. My friend has a license to carry a firearm and was carrying - we thought this would be a problem (it's a center city Philadelphia theater), but no, he didn't care about his loaded handgun. Apparently a cameraphone is the bigger threat to a movie that will be publicly released 2 hours after we step out of the theater. Of course the DVD screener has been available on usenet for 3+ months.

Filed Under: criminals, fans, guns, movies, phones, pre-screening

Will California's Governor Outlaw Police From Searching Mobile Phones Without A Warrant?

from the what-4th-amendment? dept

For years, we've discussed the legality of police searching the contents of your smartphone at a traffic stop. The issue is a bit complex legally. The law generally says that police can search through anything on your body, but that was generally meant for things like your wallet or other physical storage. When it comes to something like a smartphone, that contains all sorts of details about your life (and the ability to access a hell of a lot more) the questions become a lot trickier. It certainly feels like it should be against the 4th Amendment to allow such searches without a warrant -- but the courts have been mixed. Tragically, earlier this year, California's Supreme Court ruled that such searches were perfectly legal without a warrant. In response, the California legislature passed a bill, SB 914, which would require police to get a warrant.

But there's a problem: Governor Jerry Brown hasn't signed it yet.

Despite petitions and a variety of editorials urging him to sign it, he's still sitting on it (he has until October 9th). Wired is reporting a rumor that Brown has agreed to veto the legislation in an effort to please the "law enforcement lobby."

As the Wired article notes, the law itself is already pretty weak, allowing law enforcement to ignore the warrant requirement under vaguely defined emergency circumstances. It also doesn't require any official reporting of such uses where the warrant requirement is ignored, meaning that such an exception might be abused. But it certainly takes things a big step in the right direction concerning an individual's right to privacy. Hopefully Governor Brown recognizes this and signs the bill.

Filed Under: 4th amendment, california, jerry brown, privacy, smartphone, warrants

Austin Police Planned... Then Postponed Wardriving Plans In An Attempt To Shutdown Open WiFi

from the um,-but-it's-legal dept

Jonathan Rumion alerted us to a plan by the Austin, Texas police department to conduct a massive war drive around the city, looking for open WiFi networks, with the plan to try to find the owners, and tell them to lock up their WiFi networks. We've heard of similar campaigns in the past. Rumion was reasonably concerned about this effort -- and whether it was because of him asking questions, or other reasons, it looks like the Austin police have postponed this effort for the time being.

Either way, it raises lots of questions. Having an open WiFi network is not against the law, so should the police really be going around telling people to lock up their WiFi? It's also not at all clear how they're figuring out who actually owns the open WiFi networks. Rumion was also concerned about what the police might do with the data they collect, though I don't think that should be an issue -- that data is public. Still, it does seem like a questionable effort against something that remains perfectly legal.

Filed Under: austin, open wifi, wifi, wireless