“While that’s a fairly novel conclusion, it’s important that courts are beginning to look at these issues on their own terms,” Crocker told Forbes.

In particular, Westmore observed alphanumeric passcodes and biometrics served the same purpose in unlocking phones. Again in the Golden State, the feds wanted to go onto a premises and force unlock devices with fingerprints, regardless of what phones or who was inside.Īndrew Crocker, senior staff attorney at the digital rights nonprofit Electronic Frontier Foundation, said the latest California ruling went a step further than he’d seen other courts go. In 2016, Forbes uncovered a search warrant not dissimilar to the one in California. Over recent years, the government has drawn criticism for its smartphone searches.

Facebook has been willing to hand over such messages in a significant number of previous cases Forbes has reviewed. They could, for instance, ask Facebook to provide Messenger communications, she suggested. There were other ways the government could get access to relevant data in the Facebook extortion case “that do not trample on the Fifth Amendment,” Westmore added. “The undersigned finds that a biometric feature is analogous to the 20 nonverbal, physiological responses elicited during a polygraph test, which are used to determine guilt or innocence, and are considered testimonial.” “If a person cannot be compelled to provide a passcode because it is a testimonial communication, a person cannot be compelled to provide one’s finger, thumb, iris, face, or other biometric feature to unlock that same device,” the judge wrote.

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