Graduate Student Unveils Sprint's GPS Sharing With Feds > 911?

911?

"...According to Sprint, the company also has to get a court order before a person can be tracked via GPS, except in "special circumstances" -- which include tracking a 911 caller, a missing person, or with a customer's consent......"

I can really understand these things being tracked, and don't have issues with such. The 911 issue can help with someone who may get the call out but can't speak or passes out in an accident, or maybe when a small child uses the phone to call 911 for a family member. Missing persons explains itself really. I'd love to see how far the customers consent one goes, especially for expensive stolen phones from people.

but does that mean that they're counting 911 calls as part of the 8 million?

I would feel much less worried about 8 million instances of tracking if i knew that 7 or 7.5 or even 7.99 million were 911 or missing person calls, and the rest were warranted.

Maybe they'll release a breakdown sometime? (unlikely though)

reply to Killa200
I have to wonder if the "customer's consent" part is somehow obtained when each Sprint customer uses their Sprint Navigation application.

I know that usage of the GPS in Palm Pre devices shares quite a bit of GPS data with Google and others; I wouldn't be surprised if the authorities have somehow managed to get their grubby little paws in on the action there.
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To all liberals: I am NOT one of your parents, so get the heck out of my wallet. It's time for you to grow up and take some personal responsibility for taking care of yourselves, which means not relying on the government to give it all to you.