Confidentiality of browsing records

[Dspp at aol.com]

In a message dated 97-03-13 15:28:58 EST, teshima at hawaii.edu (Lani
Teshima-Miller) writes:

<< I've found this discussion to be very interesting and enlightening. When
 it comes right down to it, whether "hitting the back button" by a police 
 officer is legal or not, will be decided by the courts. I don't think
 that's happened yet, has it? How would a judge see this? [Of course once a
 test case *does* go through, whichever way it is decided may affect others
 for a long time.]  >>

There is an exception to the warrant requirement where the officer feels that
there is a real danger of the evidence being destroyed.  I will not
rationalize an exception to the Constitution (ask the Supreme Court to do
that), but it seems to me that libraries ought to require warrants before
allowing records to be handed to the police. If the caches are purged
automatically and the URL histories are write-protected, then there is no
evidence to be had unless the police are at the machine when someone does the
act; if the officer is there and presses the back button, then I would
consider the search illegal since he or she could have the computer remain
unused until a warrant is obtained. This requirement is not onerous, and it
protects the privacy of the users from warrantless searches.

My 2 copper pieces.

DSP Popeck