Tag Archives: Fifth Amendment

Can Law Enforcement Force You To Use Your Finger to Unlock Your Phone?

Can a fingerprint alone provide “testimony” about a person?  Earlier this month, a federal court in California said yes.  But the court was not engaging in a highly-localized form of palm-reading; rather, the question arose in the ever-evolving field of how to balance law enforcement needs and individual citizens’ privacy interests as new technologies emerge.

The United States District Court for the Northern District of California has been a hotspot for privacy-related litigation,… More