Ellen Nakashima, Washington Post; Tech firm is fighting a federal order for data on visitors to an anti-Trump website
"On Friday, DreamHost filed a reply arguing that the warrant’s breadth violates the Fourth Amendment because it failed to describe with “particularity” the items to be seized. Asking for “all records or other information” pertaining to the site, including “all files, databases and database records” is far too broad, the company said.
The warrant also raises First Amendment issues, it said. Visitors to the protest site should have the right to keep their identities private, but if they fear that the Justice Department will have information on them, that will chill their freedom of speech and association, the company argued.
The company said that the warrant would require them to turn over data on potentially tens of thousands of law-abiding website visitors.
Mark Rumold, staff attorney for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, said that no plausible explanation exists for a search warrant of such breadth, “other than to cast a digital dragnet as broadly as possible.”
He said that the government appears to be investigating a conspiracy to riot, “but it’s doing it in a blunt manner that does not take into account the significant First Amendment interests.”"
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