Thursday 11-10-11

Supreme Court Hears Whether GPS Counts as 'Big Brother'

Citizens traveling public highways should have no expectation of privacy just because police are tracking their movements through GPS rather than in person, the U.S. government argued Tuesday in a case before the Supreme Court that pits the interest of law enforcement against individual privacy rights.

The dispute springs from a situation in which police affixed a GPS tracking device to a suspect's car without a proper warrant. It monitored the suspect's movements for several weeks, noting where his vehicle went and how long it stayed at each location.

While much of the data was ultimately excluded as inadmissible in court, after a mistrial the suspect was convicted of conspiring to distribute cocaine.

His lawyer subsequently argued that use of the GPS device violated his Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable search and seizure.

But, Deputy Solicitor General Michael R. Dreeben, who argued the case for the government, said movements along public roadways have no guarantee of privacy, and police could have obtained the same information by having a team of officers follow the suspect.

As technology advances, it provides law enforcement agencies the opportunity to operate more efficiently.

"In an era of scarce resources it allows law enforcement to do more with less," attorney Todd Hinnen, a partner at Perkins Coie Law Firm, who was not involved in the case, noted to Fox News.

But critics, including the America Civil Liberties Union, warn that the government's warrantless surveillance power must be carefully limited.

In its brief filed in the case, the ACLU wrote, "Without judicial oversight, the police could track unlimited numbers of people for days, weeks, or months at a time. Americans could never be confident that they were free from round-the-clock surveillance of their activities."

During Tuesday's arguments, most of the justices seemed to have similar concerns.

"If you win this case then there is nothing to prevent the police or the government from monitoring 24 hours a day the public movement of every citizen of the United States," Justice Stephen Breyer told the government lawyer. "You suddenly produce what sounds like 1984."

That wasn't the only time George Orwell's chilling novel detailing a society marked by constant government surveillance was invoked during arguments.

Justice Sonia Sotomayor noted the array of satellites now able to photograph much of Earth.

"I don't see that far in the future when those cameras are going to be able to show you the entire world and let you track somebody on the camera from place to place," she said.

But the justices also pressed Stephen Leckar, the attorney arguing the case, to explain why the GPS tracking device should be disallowed if it simply provided the same information that actual officers could have obtained manually.

"The police could have had round-the-clock surveillance on this individual for a whole month or for two months or for three months, and that would not have violated anything, would it?" asked Justice Antonin Scalia.

"No," Leckar replied.

That answer led Justice Samuel Alito to continue the line of questioning.

"What is the difference in terms of one's privacy whether you're followed by a police officer for 12 hours and you don't see the officer or whether you're monitored by GPS for 12 hours?" he asked.

Leckar seemed to struggle to come up with an answer that satisfied his skeptical questioners.

But he also inadvertently sparked one of the hearing's lighter moments. When asked to differentiate the use of GPS devices from London society, where cameras line nearly every intersection in the city, Lecker responded that the situation in London "is pretty scary."

Scalia was more than a little hesitant to accept that as a legal argument.

"Well, it must be unconstitutional if it's scary," Scalia said as the courtroom erupted into prolonged laughter. "I mean, what is it, the scary provision of what article?"

The court's opinion is due sometime before the end of the term in June 2012.

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/11/08/supreme-court-hears-whether-gps-counts-as-big-brother/#ixzz1dE0QlkOU

Senate bill powers up state online sales taxes

State governments would be able to collect online sales taxes under a bill due to be introduced in the Senate on Wednesday, said sources familiar with the bill.

Supporters of the online sales tax collection requirement include Wal-Mart Stores Inc, Target Corp and other "big box" retailers who argue they are at a disadvantage against online-only competitors.

A bipartisan group of up to seven senators will introduce the bill, which is broader than similar legislation introduced in the Senate in July. The new bill will differ from a bill in the House of Representatives by affecting more small businesses under a lower exemption threshold, the sources said.

State and local governments support the upcoming bill even more than earlier measures.

Retailers have been exempted from collecting taxes on sales in states where they do not have a physical presence since a 1992 Supreme Court case -- before the advent of e-commerce.

Backers of the new bill say state and local governments will lose $24 billion in uncollected sales taxes in 2012 without the power to tax Web transactions. States have worked for more than a decade to streamline rules and get congressional approval to collect the taxes.

Backers hope the online tax bill will get swept up in bipartisan support for a bill that would eliminate the 3 percent withholding on payments to government contractors.

That bill already passed the House and is expected to pass in the Democrat-led Senate later this week.

Supporters hope the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction, known as the "super committee," will add the sales tax proposal to its recommendations due later this month.

'LEVELS THE PLAYING FIELD'

The storefront retail industry "strongly stands by the legislation being introduced because it levels the playing field," said Danny Diaz, a spokesman for the Alliance for Main Street Fairness, which represents many large retail chain stores, such as Wal-Mart.

Opponents of the Senate legislation say it does not go far enough to protect small businesses. The bill is expected to include an exemption for businesses with less than $500,000 in annual sales.

That exemption for small businesses "is way too low," said Carl Szabo, policy counsel for NetChoice, which represents, AOL Inc, eBay Inc, Yahoo Inc and other Internet companies.

The House version has a $1 million exemption for small businesses that is still too low, Szabo said.

The small business exemption should be as high as $20 million, said Jonathan Johnson, president of Overstock.com Inc..

The "big box" retailers want the small business exemption "as low as possible" to keep "competitors from growing up and competing against them," Johnson said in an interview on Tuesday.

The federal legislation should spare businesses from lawsuits that might arise if they incorrectly collect the wrong amount of sales tax, Johnson said.

Additionally, businesses should get a small share of the tax revenue to cover their compliance costs, he said.

LAWMAKERS TAKE POSITIONS

Congress "shouldn't burden businesses with costs that should be borne by the state," he said. "If we are being asked to do the states' work for them, we should be compensated."

Republican sponsors are expected to be Senators Lamar Alexander, Mike Enzi, Roy Blunt and John Boozman.

Democrats backing it include Senators Richard Durbin, who sponsored similar legislation this summer, Tim Johnson and Jack Reed. The Obama administration is also expected to endorse this bill, a source said.

Other members of Congress are fighting against the bill. Last week, Senate Democrat Ron Wyden and Republican Kelly Ayotte introduced a resolution calling on Congress not to enact legislation that would authorize state governments to collect online sales taxes. A similar resolution was introduced in the House in February.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/11/09/us-usa-salestax-idUSTRE7A801H20111109?feedType=RSS&feedName=internetNews&rpc=22&sp=true